[extropy-chat] still no biscuit!

[Damien Broderick]

At 03:24 PM 1/19/2005 -0500, Eliezer wrote:


>the hypothesis of conservation of momentum is not that momentum is 
>conserved 90% of the time or even 99.9999% of the time.  The hypothesis of 
>conservation of momentum is that momentum is conserved 100.00000% of the 
>time.  We may be uncertain, but the hypothesis of "conservation of 
>momentum" hypothesizes a state of affairs in which reality is *not* 
>uncertain; a reality in which it is *absolutely certain* that momentum 
>will be conserved on each and every occasion.

It's true that physicists thought so 100 years ago. Then they found that 
with the conjugate properties position and momentum, 100% accuracy in 
measuring position meant momentum went all over the ship. Bugger, eh?

Granted, `reality' as Eliezer is using it refers to immense ensembles of 
individually uncertain events, so that by and large observed macroscopic 
momentum is pretty robust, even if its substrate is only statistical. But 
let's not go all 19th century on Brett's ass.

Damien Broderick