X-Message-Number: 8284
Subject: QM, omega point, etc.
Date: Thu, 05 Jun 1997 11:06:49 -0400
From: "Perry E. Metzger" <>

> From: Mike Perry <>
> 
> Of course, this is just with the many-worlds version. Some other
> versions of QM really do have "chance"--absolutely unpre-
> determined events. Then there are other ("hidden-variable") theories, that
> attempt to rescue determinism in another way, making events depend
> on conditions in your own reality that cannot be observed directly.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it appears to me that Bell's Theorem
makes hidden variable theories impossible.

> Frank Tipler, in particular, with 
> his gravitational collapse of the universe to the Omega Point, argues
> that, by detecting the in-streaming photons you should be able to
> retrodict distant historical events through a property known as phase 
> conservation. In that way we could supposedly reconstruct minute 
> details even of our prehistoric past, including how to resurrect 
> everybody who has died, in the form of exact replicas.

I have strong doubts about this -- in particular, the universe doesn't
appear to conserve information "nicely". Information may be conserved,
but lots of it gets "hidden" by dropping inconveniently into things
like black holes. Also, it is far from clear that you can reconstruct
the past positions of all particles even given "infinite" computing
resources if the process of conducting the computing itself increases
the complexity of backtracking the particle states.

I have severe doubts about the "omega point" notion, cute as it may
be. In particular, I think that it is a theory with way too many
conditionals on it, all of which must be true.

Perry

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