Dec 11, 2019 06:55 PM
Is the Anthropic Principle scientific?
https://backreaction.blogspot.com/2019/1...tific.html
INTRO (Sabine Hossenfelder): Today I want to explain why the anthropic principle is a good, scientific principle. I want to talk about this, because the anthropic principle seems to be surrounded by a lot of misunderstanding, especially for what its relation to the multiverse is concerned.
Let me start with clarifying what we are talking about. I often hear people refer to the anthropic principle to say that a certain property of our universe is how it is because otherwise we would not be here to talk about it. That’s roughly correct, but there are two ways of interpreting this statement, which gives you a strong version of the anthropic principle, and a weak version.
The strong version has it that our existence causes the universe to be how it is. This is not necessarily an unscientific idea, but so-far no one has actually found a way to make it scientifically useful. You could for example imagine that if you managed to define well enough what a “human being” is, then you could show that the universe must contain certain forces with certain properties and thereby explain why the laws of nature are how they are.
However, I sincerely doubt that we will ever have a useful theory based on the strong anthropic principle. [...] Let us then come to the weak version of the anthropic principle. It says that the universe must have certain properties because otherwise our own existence would not be possible. Please note the difference to the strong version. In the weak version of the anthropic principle, human existence is neither necessary nor unavoidable. It is simply an observed fact that humans exist in this universe. And this observed fact leads to constraints on the laws of nature... (MORE - details)
https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/gtGSkhEKh6o
Nicolas Bourbaki: The greatest mathematician who never was
https://theconversation.com/nicolas-bour...was-122845
EXCERPT: By many measures, Nicolas Bourbaki ranks among the greatest mathematicians of the 20th century. Largely unknown today, Bourbaki is likely the last mathematician to master nearly all aspects of the field. A consummate collaborator, he made fundamental contributions to important mathematical fields such as set theory and functional analysis. He also revolutionized mathematics by emphasizing rigor in place of conjecture. There’s just one problem: Nicolas Bourbaki never existed. [...] If Bourbaki never existed, who – or what – was he?
The name Nicolas Bourbaki first appeared in a place rocked by turmoil at a volatile time in history: Paris in 1934. World War I had wiped out a generation of French intellectuals. As a result, the standard university-level calculus textbook had been written more than two and half decades before and was out of date. Newly minted professors André Weil and Henri Cartan wanted a rigorous method to teach Stokes’ theorem, a key result of calculus. After realizing that others had similar concerns, Weil organized a meeting. It took place December 10, 1934 at a Parisian café called Capoulade.
The nine mathematicians in attendance agreed to write a textbook “to define for 25 years the syllabus for the certificate in differential and integral calculus by writing, collectively, a treatise on analysis,” which they hoped to complete in just six months. As a joke, they named themselves after an old French general who had been duped in the Franco-Prussian war. As they proceeded, their original goal of elucidating Stokes’ theorem expanded to laying out the foundations of all mathematics. Eventually, they began to hold regular Bourbaki “conferences” three times a year to discuss new chapters for the treatise... (MORE)
https://backreaction.blogspot.com/2019/1...tific.html
INTRO (Sabine Hossenfelder): Today I want to explain why the anthropic principle is a good, scientific principle. I want to talk about this, because the anthropic principle seems to be surrounded by a lot of misunderstanding, especially for what its relation to the multiverse is concerned.
Let me start with clarifying what we are talking about. I often hear people refer to the anthropic principle to say that a certain property of our universe is how it is because otherwise we would not be here to talk about it. That’s roughly correct, but there are two ways of interpreting this statement, which gives you a strong version of the anthropic principle, and a weak version.
The strong version has it that our existence causes the universe to be how it is. This is not necessarily an unscientific idea, but so-far no one has actually found a way to make it scientifically useful. You could for example imagine that if you managed to define well enough what a “human being” is, then you could show that the universe must contain certain forces with certain properties and thereby explain why the laws of nature are how they are.
However, I sincerely doubt that we will ever have a useful theory based on the strong anthropic principle. [...] Let us then come to the weak version of the anthropic principle. It says that the universe must have certain properties because otherwise our own existence would not be possible. Please note the difference to the strong version. In the weak version of the anthropic principle, human existence is neither necessary nor unavoidable. It is simply an observed fact that humans exist in this universe. And this observed fact leads to constraints on the laws of nature... (MORE - details)
Nicolas Bourbaki: The greatest mathematician who never was
https://theconversation.com/nicolas-bour...was-122845
EXCERPT: By many measures, Nicolas Bourbaki ranks among the greatest mathematicians of the 20th century. Largely unknown today, Bourbaki is likely the last mathematician to master nearly all aspects of the field. A consummate collaborator, he made fundamental contributions to important mathematical fields such as set theory and functional analysis. He also revolutionized mathematics by emphasizing rigor in place of conjecture. There’s just one problem: Nicolas Bourbaki never existed. [...] If Bourbaki never existed, who – or what – was he?
The name Nicolas Bourbaki first appeared in a place rocked by turmoil at a volatile time in history: Paris in 1934. World War I had wiped out a generation of French intellectuals. As a result, the standard university-level calculus textbook had been written more than two and half decades before and was out of date. Newly minted professors André Weil and Henri Cartan wanted a rigorous method to teach Stokes’ theorem, a key result of calculus. After realizing that others had similar concerns, Weil organized a meeting. It took place December 10, 1934 at a Parisian café called Capoulade.
The nine mathematicians in attendance agreed to write a textbook “to define for 25 years the syllabus for the certificate in differential and integral calculus by writing, collectively, a treatise on analysis,” which they hoped to complete in just six months. As a joke, they named themselves after an old French general who had been duped in the Franco-Prussian war. As they proceeded, their original goal of elucidating Stokes’ theorem expanded to laying out the foundations of all mathematics. Eventually, they began to hold regular Bourbaki “conferences” three times a year to discuss new chapters for the treatise... (MORE)