What does it mean to say reality may turn out to be zero?

San Francisco CA

Description

What does it mean to say that the information content of reality may turn out to be zero? Informally, perhaps consider the (classical) Library of Babel. (cf. The Library of Babel)The Library of Babel contains all possible books with all possible words and letters in all possible combinations. The Library of Babel has zero information content. Yet somewhere amid the nonsense lies the complete works of Shakespeare - and you and me. However, the Library of Babel is classical. Withdrawing a book from the Library of Babel yields a single definite classical outcome - thereby creating information. Withdrawing more books creates more information. If we sum two ordinary non-zero probabilities, then we always get a bigger probability. All analogies break down somewhere. Evidently, we aren't literally living in Borges’ Library of Babel. So instead of the classical Library of Babel, let us tighten the analogy. Imagine the quantum Library of Babel. Just as in standard probability theory, if there are two ways in QM that something can happen, then we get the total amplitude for something by summing the amplitudes for each of the two ways. If we sum two ordinary non-zero probabilities, then we always get a bigger probability. Yet because amplitudes in QM are complex numbers, summing two amplitudes can yield zero. Having two ways to do something in quantum mechanics can make it not happen. Recall again the double-slit experiment. Adding a slit to the apparatus can make particles less likely to arrive somewhere despite there being more ways to get there. Now scale up the double-slit experiment to the whole of reality. The information content of the universal state vector is zero. (cf. Jan-Markus Schwindt, "Nothing happens in the Universe of the Everett Interpretation": PDF) The quantum Library of Babel has no information. Caveats? Loose ends? The superposition principle has been experimentally tested only up to the level of fullerenes, though more ambitious experiments are planned (cf. Physicists propose 'Schrödinger's virus' experiment) Some scientists still expect the unitary Schrödinger dynamics will need to be supplemented or modified for larger systems - violating the information-less zero ontology that we're exploring here. Consciousness? Does the superposition principle break down in our minds? After all, we see live or dead cats, not live-and-dead-cat superpositions. Yet this assumption of classical outcomes - even non-unique classical outcomes - presupposes that we have direct perceptual access to the mind-independent world. Controversially (cf. Max Tegmark critiques quantum mind), perhaps the existence of our phenomenally-bound classical world-simulations itself depends on ultra-rapid quantum-coherent neuronal superpositions in the CNS. For if the superposition principle really broke down in the mind-brain, as classical neuroscience assumes, then we'd at most be so-called "micro-experiential zombies” - just patterns of discrete, decohered Jamesian neuronal “mind-dust” incapable of phenomenally simulating a live or a dead classical cat. (cf. https://www.physicalism.com/#6 This solution to the phenomenal binding problem awaits experimental falsification with tomorrow's tools of molecular matter-wave interferometry. (cf. Non-materialist Physicalism) What about the countless different values of consciousness? How can an informationless zero ontology possibly explain the teeming diversity of our experience? Well, just as the conserved constants in physics cancel out to zero, and just as all of mathematics can in principle be derived from the properties of the empty set, perhaps the solutions to the field-theoretic equations of QFT mathematically encode the textures of consciousness. If we had a cosmic analogue of the Rosetta stone, then we'd see that these values inescapably "cancel out" to zero too. Unfortunately, it's hard to think of any experimental tests for this highly speculative conjecture.