# Non-Experts and Science **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 17, 2017, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866 "2017-08-17T11:41:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2017, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/201 "2017-08-28T16:55:31Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > The double-slit experiment quite clearly demonstrates this. > > When ‘which-way’ information is erased before we examine the photosensitive screen, at any point after that when we look at the screen it shows an interference pattern. This means that any information showing which-way now does not exist in our current realty and the photosensitive screen has to reflect this by being ‘consistent’ by showing interference pattern (in other worlds no particles). It does not matter how long you leave it to look at the screen, the result will be the same. Our consciousness has revealed what the current reality is in terms of information. Well, no, as a contributor to the physics forum puts it: > **[Double slit experiment -- consciousness and information](https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/double-slit-experiment-consciousness-and-information.902417/)** > > I am not a physicist but I am interested in the double slit experiment and would like a definitive answer, from a physicist, to my question as follows:. If the which path is just detected by a detector, without it flashing and bleeping at the same... [QUOTE=phinds] There is zero requirement that there EVER be a conscious observer. That’s a mistaken point of view that was abandoned about 100 years ago but persists in pop-sci presentations. ANY white-path detection destroys the interference. [/QUOTE] And why is that? > **[International Skeptics Forum](https://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=253014)** > > Join the International Skeptics Forum to discuss and promote critical thinking across the planet. [QUOTE=Brian-M] It’s not actually an observer that makes the difference. It’s taking a measurement that makes the difference, and this effect occurs regardless of whether or not any observer exists to view the results. But it’s still called the observer effect because you can’t observe which slit the particle passes through without some kind of measuring device to detect it, and if you don’t plan to observe it, you wouldn’t bother using a measuring device. [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2017, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/202 "2017-08-28T18:31:15Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > What all this really shows is that physical reality is a myth and that it is\* information\* (+ consciousness) that is the only real basis of reality This is wrong no matter how many times you repeat it. You claim to be learning things. Isn’t one of the definitions of “learning” not repeating things that you have been told are wrong? ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2017, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/203 "2017-08-28T22:03:03Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > Also, you seem to regard ‘physical’ objects (like water, for example) as not containing information. Nothing could be further from the truth. It seems like you’re assigning some concreteness to the idea of “information” apart from us describing something. Information is inherently linked to its being described, and the longer it would take us to describe it, the more information we say it has. It’s a very abstract concept. Water doesn’t “contain information”; rather if we want to describe the water, we have to put it in terms of words or numbers or whatever, and that communication between conscious beings is what we refer to as information. > [@](#): > > The question then arises as to what underlies or all this ‘science?’ > > The only common factors can be a)Information and b) Consciousness. > > Information has to be available in the first place in order to be discovered by us, but equally consciousness is also required to interpret information. This is backwards. The physical world exists. If we, as conscious beings, want to describe it, we use information to do so. Information doesn’t have any meaning without two ends of a communications channel. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/204 "2017-08-29T04:59:35Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > Classical physics is not quantum physics. We have two versions of reality and that is not good. Wrong, for all the reasons already explained to you multiple times. If you are unable or unwilling to understand this, I won’t waste more of anybody else’s time trying to explain it again. > [@abashed](#): > > Now, this is direct scientific evidence of information playing the main role in reality forming (as well as consciousness to a lesser extent). […] > > It’s not a question of employing no assumptions about reality, that is impossible. It’s a question of employing the simplest and least number of assumptions based on experimental data, which information theory meets. Hiding behind vague broad-brush terms that you refuse to define precisely isn’t “simplifying”: it’s obfuscating. If you can’t or won’t define exactly what you mean by “information” and “consciousness”, then your claim that those concepts in any way simplify or reduce the assumptions you’re making is entirely meaningless. ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/205 "2017-08-29T06:31:57Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Wrong, for all the reasons already explained to you multiple times. If you are unable or unwilling to understand this, I won’t waste more of anybody else’s time trying to explain it again. "Through years of research, physicists have experimentally confirmed with tremendous accuracy virtually every prediction made by these two theories \*\*when in \*\*\*\*their appropriate domains of applicability. \*\*In accordance with their findings, scientists also learned that GR and QFT, as they are currently formulated, **are mutually incompatible – they cannot both be right."** > **[Theory of everything](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_everything)** > > A theory of everything (TOE), final theory, ultimate theory, unified field theory or master theory is a hypothetical, singular, all-encompassing, coherent theoretical framework of physics that fully explains and links together all aspects of the universe.: 6  Finding a theory of everything is one of the major unsolved problems in physics. > Over the past few centuries, two theoretical frameworks have been developed that, together, most closely resemble a theory of everything. These two theories up... Please do your homework before making silly pronouncements. 🙂 > [@](#): > > Hiding behind vague broad-brush terms that you refuse to define precisely isn’t “simplifying”: it’s obfuscating. > > If you can’t or won’t define exactly what you mean by “information” and “consciousness”, then your claim that those concepts in any way simplify or reduce the assumptions you’re making is entirely meaningless. I have but you haven’t been paying attention. ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/206 "2017-08-29T07:01:06Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Well, no, as a contributor to the physics forum puts it: > > [Double slit experiment -- consciousness and information](https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/double-slit-experiment-consciousness-and-information.902417/) Here’s a clue - from your link: “Perhaps the two Texas A&M PHd research physicists should also read these books, as well as the ex NASA physicist Tom Campbell. Also, do you think Professor Jim Al-Khalili should alter his YouTube video because the detectors do not need to flash and bleep and showing them flashing and bleeping gives people the impression that consciousness is required when it really is not.” I think I’d go with the two Texas A&M PHd research physicists as well as Prof. Jim AL-Khalili wouldn’t you? The people who go on those messageboards are really not qualified to pass an opinion. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 7:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/207 "2017-08-29T07:08:32Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > > [@Kimstu](#): > > > > If you can’t or won’t define exactly what you mean by “information” and “consciousness”, then your claim that those concepts in any way simplify or reduce the assumptions you’re making is entirely meaningless. > > I have but you haven’t been paying attention. Oh good, if you have in fact given precise definitions of what you mean by “information” and “consciousness”, then you can quote or cite the exact places in your previous post(s) where you did so, and I can read what they are. Great, let’s see them. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 7:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/208 "2017-08-29T07:17:21Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > "Through years of research, physicists have experimentally confirmed with tremendous accuracy virtually every prediction made by these two theories \*\*when in \*\*\*\*their appropriate domains of applicability. \*\*In accordance with their findings, scientists also learned that GR and QFT, as they are currently formulated, **are mutually incompatible – they cannot both be right."** > > [Theory of everything - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_everything) Your quote doesn’t make the point that you apparently think it does, because you apparently didn’t bother to read or understand what “GR” means. The point that we were disagreeing about (because you have been stubbornly clinging to your mistaken view of it) is whether classical physics is fundamentally incompatible in any way with quantum physics. It isn’t, because classical physics is actually just a small simple **subset** of quantum physics. There’s nothing about classical physics that contradicts or is incompatible with quantum physics in any way whatsoever. What you have dredged up there, on the other hand, is an irrelevant quote about the relationship between quantum physics and **general relativity** (GR). General relativity isn’t classical physics. ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 9:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/209 "2017-08-29T09:41:09Z")
> [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](#): > > No; it’s because of the observations made so far in the progress of science that we (well, I, at any rate) believe that there’s an independently existing world out there. It’s simply the most natural explanation capable of accounting for all observable evidence, and the otherwise miraculous effectiveness of our scientific models. Plus, it doesn’t depend on magic and mysticism: on your account, ‘consciousness’ (whatever that may be) acts on ‘information’ (whatever you take that to mean) to just somehow poof the world into existence. This isn’t a deep explanatory insight; it’s ‘solving’ a difficult problem by substituting an intractable one. But it doesn’t account for all observable evidence. If it did I would agree with you. To return, once again, to the double-slit experiment, when data, or information, about which way a particle went through a slit is destroyed, any information registered on the back screen is held in potential. In other words, it does not really exist yet until someone looks at it. Now, when looked at we see an interference pattern, which means at the moment someone looks at the screen it is forced into ‘fitting in’ to the current reality frame. The current reality frame does not include any information about particles, hence, no particle information is registered on the screen. This is totally at odds with what happens in an ‘objective’ world where doing something after an event has happened does not change the original event. In this experiment destroying which-way information has changed the outcome of what we see on the back screen because nothing ever really existed on it objectively, only probabilistically. No particles or interference pattern existed on the back-screen; both possibilities existed and when looked at only one of them became ‘real.’ And since no data currently existed about which-way information, the probabilistic outcome was forced into complying with the current reality by showing an interference pattern. So this experiment shows us that nothing independently exists, aside from a set of possible informationmal outcomes. Everything is essentially a probabilistic bundle of information that has to combine with some kind of observer in order to enter into our reality frame. If I go to visit a wood nobody knows anything about and there exists no information about in anywhere, then what I will see will be a random draw of viable possibilities dependent on the history of the world. It won’t necessarily be one predictable kind of wood; it could be any kind of wood permitted to exist within the ‘rules’ of the current reality frame. However, once observed, the wood is here for good, unless all information is somehow destroyed about it whereupon it is held in potential, once again. I don’t really understand why you think your view is the most natural one in light of the many ‘unnatural’ results we have collected from quantum experiments. Information theory makes no more than two assumptions. 1) There is consciousness and 2) there is information and from this base everything else flows. You say because of the observations in science you believe there is an independently existing world out there but the double-slit experiment, entanglement, quantum tunneling, etc., do not support this view. Non-locality seems here to stay yet some people still deny there is anything non-physical about it! Why cling on to old fashioned concepts that no longer fit the data? ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 9:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/210 "2017-08-29T09:47:23Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Your quote doesn’t make the point that you apparently think it does, because you apparently didn’t bother to read or understand what “GR” means. > > The point that we were disagreeing about (because you have been stubbornly clinging to your mistaken view of it) is whether classical physics is fundamentally incompatible in any way with quantum physics. It isn’t, because classical physics is actually just a small simple **subset** of quantum physics. There’s nothing about classical physics that contradicts or is incompatible with quantum physics in any way whatsoever. > > What you have dredged up there, on the other hand, is an irrelevant quote about the relationship between quantum physics and **general relativity** (GR). General relativity isn’t classical physics. Are you a troll? ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 9:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/211 "2017-08-29T09:52:53Z")
> [@](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > Also, you seem to regard ‘physical’ objects (like water, for example) as not containing information. > > They contain information in the technical sense, of course; but they don’t contain semantic information. It’s even readily quantifiable how much information they contain: up to constant factors, it’s just the logarithm of the phase space volume accessible to the system. That’s because this measures the amount of distinguishable states; and information in the technical sense is simply distinguishability. Thus, a system that can be in two states contains one bit of information, a system that can be in four states contains two bits, a system that can be in eight states three, and so on. > > But of course, you should note that this information is concept derived from the physical states of the system, or rather, the number of states available to the system. But all this is simply information. ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 10:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/212 "2017-08-29T10:28:14Z")
> [@](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > When you examine what water is you necessarily have to gather information about it in terms of its colour (if any), its texture, its, weight, its taste and so forth. > > Yes, but this information pertains to my description of water. You keep conflating between things and descriptions of things, and claiming that since descriptions contain information, things do, too. But there is no reason at all to believe so. You could equally well make the argument that everything is made from bananas—because I can phrase every description in terms of bananas. > > Water is entirely independent of my description of water; indeed, if that weren’t so, then I couldn’t have a description of water, since that description would be grounded only in itself. The point here is that we only **have** models of things, not necesarily the things in themselves. Without models we couldn’t know anything. ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/213 "2017-08-29T10:31:53Z")
> [@](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > Moreover, if you are examining what water is from a scientific perspective you have to go even further by considering how it is chemically composed and even to the atomic level as to what kinds of atoms it’s made of. So you can see that this is simply information. > > “So you can see that this is simply bananas” would be an equally justified conclusion. Nothing about what you have said justifies the leap from ‘water is described in terms of its constituent atoms’ to ‘water is made of information’, or whatever it is exactly you’re trying to argue. Again, the natural assumption is that since water is described in terms of atoms, it’s made from atoms. (And atoms aren’t information.) Atoms aren’t information? Why? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 11:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/214 "2017-08-29T11:30:06Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > Are you a troll? Do not accuse other posters of trolling outside The BBQ Pit. [/Moderating] ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 12:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/215 "2017-08-29T12:36:29Z")
> [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](#): > > No. I’m using exact terms here, for clarity. If something’s not clear to you, I’m always happy to explain. > The difference is that an EM wave is an excitation in a background electromagnetic field, while a probability is something abstract that tells us the likelihood for something to happen. If EM waves are still too abstract for you, take a water wave instead: the wave is the movement of water; however, the universe isn’t filled with some abstract ‘probability-stuff’ that could oscillate leading to a wave. Rather, it’s here our description that associates to different points in space and time different probabilities of events occurring. > > And yes, once again: our models of water waves are mathematical, and hence, in some still not quite clear sense, ‘informational’. But that doesn’t imply that water is made from information anymore than if we would use clockworks to model it implies that it is made of clockworks. EM waves are ‘physical’ in the sense they have to obey the constraints of Relativity. Probability waves are not physical in this sense but they do predict the chances of anything that is physical appearing in some place or other. You could just as well call probability waves ‘informational waves’ because it is information about probabilities that they are describing. You say the universe isn’t filled with some abstract probability stuff but experiments show that this **is** the case. How do you explain entanglement without some kind of abstract probability wave which acts instantaneously? What about superposition? ---
**Author:** ![abashed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c6cbf5/32.png) [@abashed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abashed)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/216 "2017-08-29T12:38:04Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > Do not accuse other posters of trolling outside The BBQ Pit. > > [/Moderating] Why don’t you do your job? ---
**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/217 "2017-08-29T12:39:46Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > Atoms aren’t information? Why? Could youy repeat your definition of “information”, please? I haven’t been paying attention. As far as simple thinking me is concerned, the fact that we have information _ **about** _ atoms does not mean the atoms themselves are the information. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/218 "2017-08-29T14:40:08Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > Here’s a clue - from your link: > > “Perhaps the two Texas A&M PHd research physicists should also read these books, as well as the ex NASA physicist Tom Campbell. Also, do you think Professor Jim Al-Khalili should alter his YouTube video because the detectors do not need to flash and bleep and showing them flashing and bleeping gives people the impression that consciousness is required when it really is not.” > > I think I’d go with the two Texas A&M PHd research physicists as well as Prof. Jim AL-Khalil wouldn’t you? The people who go on those messageboards are really not qualified to pass an opinion. :rolleyes: The point was indeed that consciousness is not required. The person you quoted does (reluctantly) agree with that. And what you quoted was a reply to yet another poster that does tell you in no uncertain terms that you depend on an accident of history about why it is called the observer effect when in reality it does not need an observer and the the poster you quoted then agrees with that. Indeed he also agrees that Prof. Jim AL-Khalil and his YouTube video is really silly. So you have no idea what or why you replied at or to, besides relying on a “killing the messenger” fallacy. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/219 "2017-08-29T14:57:04Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > I think I’d go with the two Texas A&M PHd research physicists as well as Prof. Jim AL-Khalili wouldn’t you? The people who go on those messageboards are really not qualified to pass an opinion. One more thing: I had to say that this does amount to a killing the messenger logical fallacy because I actually linked to them because they offered direct explanations based on what experts out there are telling us. You are also wrong for the simple reason that many contributors there \*\*do \*\*have a clue. One of the guys I cited has a bachelor’s in physics from Harvard, I do think that they are a little bit qualified to pass an \*\*educated \*\*opinion. ---
**Author:** ![Bone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bone/32/407_2.png) [@Bone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bone)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2017, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866/220 "2017-08-29T15:15:59Z")
> [@abashed](#): > > > [@tomndebb](#): > > > > Do not accuse other posters of trolling outside The BBQ Pit. > > > > [/Moderating] > > Why don’t you do your job? Actually, enforcing the rules is the role (I think of jobs as something someone is paid to do, but that’s just me) of the moderators. Informing you that accusing other posters of trolling is not permitted in this forum is part of that. Tom could have given a warning as accusations of trolling are fairly strictly prohibited outside the Pit, but he chose not to. Another rule is that questions or comments about moderation belong in ATMB. It’s right here in the [sticky](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=818217): > [@](#): > > **Right to appeal** - For all questions, comments, and complaints about the SDMB or its moderation, please post in the About this Message Board sub-forum. The moderation staff will do their best to participate in these threads to explain the reasoning behind the action. Typically after a post is moderated as **tom** did, I tend to let go a single comment in thread because I feel like that’s reasonable. In this case however I will pass on doing so as hostile reactions to moderation call for an escalated response. This is a warning for being a jerk. Questions or comments about moderation belong in ATMB. [/moderating] [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/non-experts-and-science/793866.md?page=12)