The Parable of the Watch

[BaalChatzaf]

I have yet another Parable involving a watch. Wm. Paley first proposed a parable involving a time piece in order to show that that universe is Designed by an Intelligent Being. I propose a Parable wherein I show that our knowledge of the world is incomplete and will probably remain so. Furthermore we are compelled to resort to hypotheses which are never fully certain or provable in order to deal with the world:

My Parable of the Watch.

You are handed a timepiece with visible display. Here are the ground rules: you cannot open up the timepiece to see what is inside. You can only look at the display. You are allowed to subject the timepiece to various and sundry conditions: thermal, electromagnetic, mechanical. You can bang the thing about. You can X-ray it. You can subject it to other electrical and magnetic influences. You can put it in a fast plane or a spaceship to see what effect motion and acceleration has on the thing. The only thing you cannot do is open it up.

You will probably want to predict what effect various experiments will have on the timepiece. But to do that you must know how it works. But you can't open it up (that is a condition of this Gedanken). What can you do? You can formulate hypotheses about how it -might- work, then test your hypothesis by subjecting the timepiece to various conditions and forces and reading what it says. You can even construct a companion timepiece (whose insides you DO know about) just to see if your version behaves the same as the given timepiece. But you will never know for sure what the insides are. You will not knows if and when you can find conditions that falsify your best current hypothesis about how the insides function.

That is the Parable.

Now the Actuality:

Here is what the Parable refers to: The timepiece is the cosmos, the physical universe. Our best instruments are fifteen orders of magnitude removed from Planck Length so at best we have only a crude notion of what is happening in the very small. Our best telescopes can only get back to about 300,000 million years of the Big Bang. Any earlier than that, the cosmos is opaque to our instruments. Any application of energy to the small things of the world jiggles them about so an exact reading of all pertinent observables is impossible. For example we cannot measure -both- position and momentum with arbitrary precision no matter how fine our instruments are. The very act of measurement disrupts what we measure.

The Parable is a simple way of showing what the limitations of our knowledge of the cosmos are and are likely to remain and why we are positively compelled to make guesses (hypotheses) about the underlying works. These hypotheses are testable, but they are NOT certain. We just cannot get inside reality at the most basic level. We are, as it were, in a kind of fog in which we can discern fuzzy outlines of What is Out There. The fuzziness is quantum indeterminacy. At best we make guesses (hypotheses and theories) and test them by looking at the fuzzy things as best we can.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited November 8, 2007 by BaalChatzaf

[Judith]

I don't see that the analogy applies. If you can X-ray the watch or do spectroscopy and imaging studies of any type you like, you KNOW what is inside it. Period. No questions.

Judith

[BaalChatzaf]

I don't see that the analogy applies. If you can X-ray the watch or do spectroscopy and imaging studies of any type you like, you KNOW what is inside it. Period. No questions.

Judith

I analogize looking inside the watch (this is a parable, not a literal discussion) to knowing the cosmos down to Planck Length. We are 15 orders of magnitude removed from Planck Length even with our best and fanciest instruments. In short we do not get to see reality down to the ground floor. This is essentially the analogy of the watch whose insides we cannot see.

Our understanding of the cosmos is limited to the degree of precision our observations can achieve.

In a way, we see through the fog dimly, able to discern only fuzzy outlines of what is Out There. This is not to say we don't know anything. It is to say we only know things to a limited degree. Given the order of magnitude of our imprecision, it is unlikely that we will know physical reality down to ground level. So we make do with what we do know, which isn't all that bad.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Edited November 9, 2007 by BaalChatzaf

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Bob,

Your little parable (which is not really a parable) works surprisingly well if you let the timepiece symbolize human consciousness.

Be real careful with watchmakers...

Michael

[syrakusos]

Too bad this site does not allow "sanction" voting because if it did, I would click one up for Judith.

This should be called THE PARABLE OF THE SKUNK because my cat got hit by a skunk the other night. When I came home, the skunk waddled off in the other direction and my cat was bound and determined to find that skunk... which he did... Cleaning up my little guy, I was pretty sure that his nemesis was a male skunk because it did not have that female pheremone scent that all mammal females seem to (at least to me). But, being fifteen orders of magnitude away -- gratefully -- I could not know for sure. And I will never, ever get inside the skunk's head to know his thoughts or to share his desires. I cannot even be sure -- for lack of knowledge -- if there is more than one species of skunk or if all skunks are skunks. And that does not begin to parse out the "Problem of the Polecat" --- there are people who claim to have "descented" skunks. However, as the German word for skunk demonstrates (das Stinktier), if the animal does not have that skunky smell to it, then it lacks the sine qua non of skunkitude.

And now, here is the empirico-metricianist parallel: in the game of cribbage, for one player to be arbitrarily very far ahead of the other is to "skunk" or even "double skunk" them -- yet (inexplicably, perhaps) no additional points are awarded! Yes! It is true, thus validating (without proving) the Wiedenborg Mystery Principle!

Finally, I point out, that as the skunk waddled off, its mass and energy changed and it shrank in the direction of travel, none of which was expected by my cat!!

[Brant Gaede]

Too bad this site does not allow "sanction" voting because if it did, I would click one up for Judith.

This should be called THE PARABLE OF THE SKUNK because my cat got hit by a skunk the other night. When I came home, the skunk waddled off in the other direction and my cat was bound and determined to find that skunk... which he did... Cleaning up my little guy, I was pretty sure that his nemesis was a male skunk because it did not have that female pheremone scent that all mammal females seem to (at least to me). But, being fifteen orders of magnitude away -- gratefully -- I could not know for sure. And I will never, ever get inside the skunk's head to know his thoughts or to share his desires. I cannot even be sure -- for lack of knowledge -- if there is more than one species of skunk or if all skunks are skunks. And that does not begin to parse out the "Problem of the Polecat" --- there are people who claim to have "descented" skunks. However, as the German word for skunk demonstrates (das Stinktier), if the animal does not have that skunky smell to it, then it lacks the sine qua non of skunkitude.

And now, here is the empirico-metricianist parallel: in the game of cribbage, for one player to be arbitrarily very far ahead of the other is to "skunk" or even "double skunk" them -- yet (inexplicably, perhaps) no additional points are awarded! Yes! It is true, thus validating (without proving) the Wiedenborg Mystery Principle!

Finally, I point out, that as the skunk waddled off, its mass and energy changed and it shrank in the direction of travel, none of which was expected by my cat!!

Wash kitty in tomato juice to kill the smell.

--Brant

[Brant Gaede]

Now the Actuality:

Here is what the Parable refers to: The timepiece is the cosmos, the physical universe. Our best instruments are fifteen orders of magnitude removed from Planck Length so at best we have only a crude notion of what is happening in the very small. Our best telescopes can only get back to about 300,000 million years of the Big Bang. Any earlier than that, the cosmos is opaque to our instruments. Any application of energy to the small things of the world jiggles them about so an exact reading of all pertinent observables is impossible. For example we cannot measure -both- position and momentum with arbitrary precision no matter how fine our instruments are. The very act of measurement disrupts what we measure.

The Parable is a simple way of showing what the limitations of our knowledge of the cosmos are and are likely to remain and why we are positively compelled to make guesses (hypotheses) about the underlying works. These hypotheses are testable, but they are NOT certain. We just cannot get inside reality at the most basic level. We are, as it were, in a kind of fog in which we can discern fuzzy outlines of What is Out There. The fuzziness is quantum indeterminacy. At best we make guesses (hypotheses and theories) and test them by looking at the fuzzy things as best we can.

Ba'al Chatzaf

God is a sub-atomic particle?

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Michael,

Fifteen orders of skunk oder scale has me laughing so much I can hardly type...

Dayaamm!

Michael

[BaalChatzaf]

God is a sub-atomic particle?

--Brant

Not a testable hypothesis. Interesting theology, but it is not science.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[UncleJim]

God is a sub-atomic particle?

--Brant

Not a testable hypothesis. Interesting theology, but it is not science.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Is it even a theory?

[UncleJim]

I analogize looking inside the watch (this is a parable, not a literal discussion) to knowing the cosmos down to Planck Length. We are 15 orders of magnitude removed from Planck Length even with our best and fanciest instruments. In short we do not get to see reality down to the ground floor. This is essentially the analogy of the watch whose insides we cannot see.

Our understanding of the cosmos is limited to the degree of precision our observations can achieve.

In a way, we see through the fog dimly, able to discern only fuzzy outlines of what is Out There. This is not to say we don't know anything. It is to say we only know things to a limited degree. Given the order of magnitude of our imprecision, it is unlikely that we will know physical reality down to ground level. So we make do with what we do know, which isn't all that bad.

Ba'al Chatzaf

You said "Our understanding of the cosmos is limited to the degree of precision our observations can achieve."

At what level of precision does your above observation exist?

[BaalChatzaf]

You said "Our understanding of the cosmos is limited to the degree of precision our observations can achieve."

At what level of precision does your above observation exist?

About 10^15 times Planck Length. Also about 10^15 time Planck Time. Rather crude.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[UncleJim]

You said "Our understanding of the cosmos is limited to the degree of precision our observations can achieve."

At what level of precision does your above observation exist?

About 10^15 times Planck Length. Also about 10^15 time Planck Time. Rather crude.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Since your observations; by your own acknowledgment are "rather crude", then I would be well advised to pay little; if any, attention to what you have to say. Right?

[BaalChatzaf]

Since your observations; by your own acknowledgment are "rather crude", then I would be well advised to pay little; if any, attention to what you have to say. Right?

Wrong. I am correct on the physics. You can also look it up.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Mike11]

Since your observations; by your own acknowledgment are "rather crude", then I would be well advised to pay little; if any, attention to what you have to say. Right?

Wrong. I am correct on the physics. You can also look it up.

Ba'al Chatzaf

What can you say, he's a selective reductionist. Might be usefull for him psychologically when it comes to ethics.

[UncleJim]

Since your observations; by your own acknowledgment are "rather crude", then I would be well advised to pay little; if any, attention to what you have to say. Right?

Wrong. I am correct on the physics. You can also look it up.

Ba'al Chatzaf

That's not the issue. The issue is whether or not the physics is correct. You have taken the same position that religionists take with respect to what is written in the bible. They say since it's written in the bible then it is correct.

You said "Our understanding of the cosmos is limited to the degree of precision our observations can achieve."

This simply cannot be a true statement. Our understanding of the cosmos has no limit because there is no limit on the degree of precision our observation can achieve. This is implying that some type of intelligent external force is purposefully limiting the degree of precision of our observations. There is no evidence which will support that assertion.

[BaalChatzaf]

This simply cannot be a true statement. Our understanding of the cosmos has no limit because there is no limit on the degree of precision our observation can achieve. This is implying that some type of intelligent external force is purposefully limiting the degree of precision of our observations. There is no evidence which will support that assertion.

Wrong!

You cannot determine both the position and momentum of an object with arbitrary precision.

Google <Heisenberg Indeterminacy Principle>

Also lookup the subject on wikipedia.

By and large I have found Objectivists to be pretty lame in physics and mathematics. I don't know why, but it is the case.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[UncleJim]

This simply cannot be a true statement. Our understanding of the cosmos has no limit because there is no limit on the degree of precision our observation can achieve. This is implying that some type of intelligent external force is purposefully limiting the degree of precision of our observations. There is no evidence which will support that assertion.

Wrong!

You cannot determine both the position and momentum of an object with arbitrary precision.

Google <Heisenberg Indeterminacy Principle>

Also lookup the subject on wikipedia.

By and large I have found Objectivists to be pretty lame in physics and mathematics. I don't know why, but it is the case.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Assuming a particular measurement is not precise. How could you possibly know that? This requires that you know what the value is prior to making the measurement which is intended to give you THAT value.

Of course if you are unable to measure something without screwing up the measurement of it then you won't know what the value ought to have been. The solution is to not screw-up the measurement.

The uncertainty principle fails by its own definition. How can you possibly know when you have failed to do something unless you are able to accurately know that.

Fancy math tricks don't prove that people have a naturally limited ability to accurately investigate natural occurrences. They only prove that fancy mathematicians think they are really cute.

[Brant Gaede]

This simply cannot be a true statement. Our understanding of the cosmos has no limit because there is no limit on the degree of precision our observation can achieve. This is implying that some type of intelligent external force is purposefully limiting the degree of precision of our observations. There is no evidence which will support that assertion.

Wrong!

You cannot determine both the position and momentum of an object with arbitrary precision.

Google <Heisenberg Indeterminacy Principle>

Also lookup the subject on wikipedia.

By and large I have found Objectivists to be pretty lame in physics and mathematics. I don't know why, but it is the case.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Assuming a particular measurement is not precise. How could you possibly know that? This requires that you know what the value is prior to making the measurement which is intended to give you THAT value.

Of course if you are unable to measure something without screwing up the measurement of it then you won't know what the value ought to have been. The solution is to not screw-up the measurement.

The uncertainty principle fails by its own definition. How can you possibly know when you have failed to do something unless you are able to accurately know that.

Fancy math tricks don't prove that people have a naturally limited ability to accurately investigate natural occurrences. They only prove that fancy mathematicians think they are really cute.

An Objectivist really good in science and math--not retired--probably doesn't visit these parts much. I suggest you review the WTF of Mr. Rogers of Cypress Semiconductors, for instance.

--Brant

[Dragonfly]

Assuming a particular measurement is not precise. How could you possibly know that? This requires that you know what the value is prior to making the measurement which is intended to give you THAT value.

Of course if you are unable to measure something without screwing up the measurement of it then you won't know what the value ought to have been. The solution is to not screw-up the measurement.

The uncertainty principle fails by its own definition. How can you possibly know when you have failed to do something unless you are able to accurately know that.

Fancy math tricks don't prove that people have a naturally limited ability to accurately investigate natural occurrences. They only prove that fancy mathematicians think they are really cute.

Another Objectivist who makes a fool of himself by pontificating on a subject he's pig-ignorant about.

[tjohnson]

Assuming a particular measurement is not precise. How could you possibly know that? This requires that you know what the value is prior to making the measurement which is intended to give you THAT value.

Of course if you are unable to measure something without screwing up the measurement of it then you won't know what the value ought to have been. The solution is to not screw-up the measurement.

The uncertainty principle fails by its own definition. How can you possibly know when you have failed to do something unless you are able to accurately know that.

Fancy math tricks don't prove that people have a naturally limited ability to accurately investigate natural occurrences. They only prove that fancy mathematicians think they are really cute.

Correct me if I'm wrong Baal and DF, but uncertainty principles (there are more than one aren't there?) are about pairs of observables, not single observations? It is more about how information about one observable is related to information about another observable. It's not that difficult a concept if you think about it. As an analogy, when something moves in your field of vision quickly you don't get enough information to identify it and so your "recognition measurement" is related to the speed of the object. This is not a fancy "math trick", it is something physicists discovered and quantified.

[BaalChatzaf]

Correct me if I'm wrong Baal and DF, but uncertainty principles (there are more than one aren't there?) are about pairs of observables, not single observations? It is more about how information about one observable is related to information about another observable. It's not that difficult a concept if you think about it. As an analogy, when something moves in your field of vision quickly you don't get enough information to identify it and so your "recognition measurement" is related to the speed of the object. This is not a fancy "math trick", it is something physicists discovered and quantified.

Let P,Q be a pair of non-commuting Hermiian operators corresponding to observations that cannot be made simultaneously to arbitrary precession.

The indeterminacy principle is stated thus: [P,Q] = ih where [P,Q] is the commutator of P and Q.

That is the Heisenberg Principle.

If one wishes to be less mathematical and more physical about it, thing of the non-commutativity of position x and momentum p. If one wishes to determine x precisely one must shine a light on the body with very short wave length. But this carries a lot of energy ( E = h*c/l, where l is the wavelength). The energy kicks the shit out of the object being observed and its momentum is disrupted and cannot be measure with precision. p*x >= h . The better you have x the worse you have p and vica versa.

This principle is a fact about the world. It has nothing to do with our skill at making instruments. The principle was well known before quantum physics was invented. There is an inverse relation between wavelength and position which derives from classical optics. If you localize the position of an object in a microscopes visual field you loose wavelength (which corresponds to momentum in quantum theory).

Time and Energy is another such pair. If we measure a system over a very short interval of time we are less certain of the energy. If we want to be certain of the energy we have to stretch out the interval so we loose an instantaneous measure of the energy. That is just the way things are.

The basic fact about the universe is that there is a smallest degree of angular momentum or action. That is a basic fact about the world. One cannot make actions infinitesimally small (but greater than zero). That is just the way things are. This fact implies an upper bound on how precisely we can measure certain related pairs of observables. Think of this as an application of the Axiom of Identity.

Ba'al Chatzf

[UncleJim]

I have yet another Parable involving a watch. Wm. Paley first proposed a parable involving a time piece in order to show that that universe is Designed by an Intelligent Being. I propose a Parable wherein I show that our knowledge of the world is incomplete and will probably remain so. Furthermore we are compelled to resort to hypotheses which are never fully certain or provable in order to deal with the world:

This is true. But it is also true that that which is knowable physically exists and therefore can be known to exist. The issue is - by what method?

To say that we are able to "deal" with something of which we have no knowledge is to beg for intelligence. Any principle (mathematical or otherwise) coming from such a basis can be challenged. This is what I call "a fancy math trick." Its no better than religious dogma.

My Parable of the Watch.

You are handed a timepiece with visible display. Here are the ground rules: you cannot open up the timepiece to see what is inside. You can only look at the display. You are allowed to subject the timepiece to various and sundry conditions: thermal, electromagnetic, mechanical. You can bang the thing about. You can X-ray it. You can subject it to other electrical and magnetic influences. You can put it in a fast plane or a spaceship to see what effect motion and acceleration has on the thing. The only thing you cannot do is open it up.

You will probably want to predict what effect various experiments will have on the timepiece. But to do that you must know how it works. But you can't open it up (that is a condition of this Gedanken). What can you do? You can formulate hypotheses about how it -might- work, then test your hypothesis by subjecting the timepiece to various conditions and forces and reading what it says. You can even construct a companion timepiece (whose insides you DO know about) just to see if your version behaves the same as the given timepiece. But you will never know for sure what the insides are. You will not knows if and when you can find conditions that falsify your best current hypothesis about how the insides function.

That is the Parable.

This is much like any religious text. They also make claims which cannot be validated. In order for any religion to influence ones behavior one must first believe in what it says.

But to act properly one must know what the consequences of ones acts are prior to performing the act. Since the consequences are determined by: what one is and; where one lives; then, one cannot simply make this up (i.e., act religiously) and expected to be considered a properly functioning living organism.

Now the Actuality:

Here is what the Parable refers to: The timepiece is the cosmos, the physical universe. Our best instruments are fifteen orders of magnitude removed from Planck Length so at best we have only a crude notion of what is happening in the very small. Our best telescopes can only get back to about 300,000 million years of the Big Bang. Any earlier than that, the cosmos is opaque to our instruments. Any application of energy to the small things of the world jiggles them about so an exact reading of all pertinent observables is impossible. For example we cannot measure -both- position and momentum with arbitrary precision no matter how fine our instruments are. The very act of measurement disrupts what we measure.

But to make such a claim REQUIRES that ALL possible forms of measurement have been attempted. And there is simply no evidence that this is so!

The Parable is a simple way of showing what the limitations of our knowledge of the cosmos are and are likely to remain and why we are positively compelled to make guesses (hypotheses) about the underlying works. These hypotheses are testable, but they are NOT certain. We just cannot get inside reality at the most basic level. We are, as it were, in a kind of fog in which we can discern fuzzy outlines of What is Out There. The fuzziness is quantum indeterminacy. At best we make guesses (hypotheses and theories) and test them by looking at the fuzzy things as best we can.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Sure; of course!

But what we do know; is what we do know. This cannot be denied. We can act based on what we do know. We can make predictions of the consequences of our actions based on what we do know them to be. In other words: We can act properly as an individual human-beings.

For example: For one to convince ones grandchildren to blow themselves into millions of tiny bloody bits of meat and bone is not a proper human act. It violates what we know about what being a human-being means and how they must act to be considered a properly functioning human-being.

Edited March 10, 2008 by UncleJim

[UncleJim]

Let P,Q be a pair of non-commuting Hermiian operators corresponding to observations that cannot be made simultaneously to arbitrary precession.

The indeterminacy principle is stated thus: [P,Q] = ih where [P,Q] is the commutator of P and Q.

That is the Heisenberg Principle.

But you just forced your principle to say in advance of what you then go on to prove what it says.

If one wishes to be less mathematical and more physical about it, thing of the non-commutativity of position x and momentum p. If one wishes to determine x precisely one must shine a light on the body with very short wave length. But this carries a lot of energy ( E = h*c/l, where l is the wavelength). The energy kicks the shit out of the object being observed and its momentum is disrupted and cannot be measure with precision. p*x >= h . The better you have x the worse you have p and vica versa.

Then find another way to do it. If you're technique is faulty; stop using it. The failure of the technique does not prove anything.

This principle is a fact about the world. It has nothing to do with our skill at making instruments. The principle was well known before quantum physics was invented. There is an inverse relation between wavelength and position which derives from classical optics. If you localize the position of an object in a microscopes visual field you loose wavelength (which corresponds to momentum in quantum theory).

The principle is not a fact about the world - it's a principle. As such; if it is not based on fact, then it can be (and probably is) wrong.

This is the issue of science trying to make the world into what it says it is rather than science finding ways to discover what the world is.

Time and Energy is another such pair. If we measure a system over a very short interval of time we are less certain of the energy. If we want to be certain of the energy we have to stretch out the interval so we loose an instantaneous measure of the energy. That is just the way things are.

This is not "just the way things are." If the measuring technique is faulty - change it.

The basic fact about the universe is that there is a smallest degree of angular momentum or action. That is a basic fact about the world. One cannot make actions infinitesimally small (but greater than zero). That is just the way things are. This fact implies an upper bound on how precisely we can measure certain related pairs of observables. Think of this as an application of the Axiom of Identity.

Ba'al Chatzf

This is not the "Axiom of Identity." Sorry but; its a cop-out. Identity says that what is, is what it is. This cannot be denied.

To measure the smallest thing requires another thing which is smaller than what it is, which is used to measure what the smallest thing is. This is a contradiction on what it means to be the smallest thing. This contradiction does not require that the precision of what we do measure has an upper bound.

As we move toward measuring the smallest thing what we are using to measure things with is also getting smaller. When we reach the smallest thing there is no longer a requirement to measure it. It (the smallest thing) becomes the standard for all measurements. The standard exists absolutely. Meaning its ability to measure things is universal. The whole idea of what it means to measure things may have radically changed by this time. Measuring what exists may become the same as knowing what exists. Which simply means ones brain is being consciously stimulated by the smallest physical thing.

[BaalChatzaf]

As we move toward measuring the smallest thing what we are using to measure things with is also getting smaller. When we reach the smallest thing there is no longer a requirement to measure it. It (the smallest thing) becomes the standard for all measurements. The standard exists absolutely. Meaning its ability to measure things is universal. The whole idea of what it means to measure things may have radically changed by this time. Measuring what exists may become the same as knowing what exists. Which simply means ones brain is being consciously stimulated by the smallest physical thing.

The smallest action is h-bar (h divided by 2*pi) divided by 2. That is 1.054*10^-34 Joule-Seconds. This has been verified experimentally. Get used to it. It is a fact.

Ba'al Chatzaf