[Paleopsych] Re: Big bang in mm sizes

[Joel Isaacson]

Yes, Howard, we are talking about same/similar stuff.   I was surprised to 
see Nils Basse's
suggestion of mini-big-bangs...  especially since I have been talking about 
that possibility
for some time now...  albeit from a different perspective.

My perspective is tied to CA-like processes that are anchored in perception. 
   The self-similarity
at all scales of those Ur-Patterns is a reflection of the self-similarity of 
the underlying processes,
effected recursively.   Those underlying processes are CA-like and their 
basic rule is
local distinction-making.

The scheme is not quite mathematical in the ordinary sense, although it is 
processually
well-defined and readily representable by ordinary computational processes.  
  Many of the usual CA rules have some mathematical flavor.  However, here 
we have the rule of distinction-making that is a natural process common in 
the biology of perception -- not necessarily thru formal mathematical means.

I do agree that mathematics serves via metaphors vis-a-vis natural processes 
described by same,
and that all we could expect is finding/adopting the best mathematical 
metaphor that
may fit a particular natural phenomenon.   My CA-like processes, while not 
strictly mathematical,
serve the same purpose;  i.e., are metaphors aimed at a sweeping capture of 
natural
phenomena, from visual perception (and perception in general) to processes 
generating
elementary particles, and big bang-like scenarios, and many things in 
between...

Btw, I corresponded with Noam Chomsky in 1972 about those CA...  but it has 
been
obviously premature...  he has been very polite but professed to not 
"understand
the import" of these things.    Nevertheless, I did adopt his notions of 
surface
and deep structures and incorporated those into the patent application in 
1975.

-- Joel



>From: HowlBloom at aol.com
>To: isaacsonj at hotmail.com
>CC: paleopsych at paleopsych.org
>Subject: Re: Big bang in mm sizes
>Date: Fri, 10 Jun 2005 01:03:14 EDT
>
>
>
>As always, we are on the same wavelength, Joel.  This article has Ur
>Patterns written all over it--patterns that show up on multiple level of  
>emergence,
>patterns that metaphors can capture.
>
>Why are these patterns so easily graspable by metaphor?  Because  metaphor 
>is
>one concrete example of an Ur Pattern that repeats itself on  multiple
>levels.  Meaning that metaphor is not just a literary trick.   It is a way 
>of
>capturing something deep and repetitive in this cosmos--a deep  structure 
>if you
>prefer to use Noam Chomsky's vocabulary.
>
>Not all metaphors are valid.  But when you find the right one for the
>phenomenon you're watching, you've hit gold.
>
>And never forget, math is metaphor in disguise.  Onward--Howard
>
>In a message dated 6/9/2005 2:23:17 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
>isaacsonj at hotmail.com writes:
>
>
>
>Plasma in reactors echoes distribution of galaxies
>11 June  2005
>NewScientist.com news service
>Mark Anderson
>
>NUCLEAR fusion  reactors could be used to study what the universe was like
>just after the  big bang. So claims a physicist who noticed that the plasma
>created inside  these reactors is distributed in a strikingly similar way 
>to
>galaxies in  today's universe.
>
>Nils Basse of the Massachusetts Institute of  Technology does not normally
>concern himself with events in the early  universe. Instead, he studies
>turbulence in the plasma created in fusion  reactors. But when he chanced
>upon the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) -  which is mapping a quarter of 
>the
>sky in detail - he noticed something  uncanny. The mathematical equation
>governing the distribution of voids and  galaxies looks remarkably like the
>one describing the millimetre-sized  knots and clots of plasma in the
>Wendelstein 7-AS "stellarator" fusion  reactor in Garching, Germany 
>(Physics
>Letters A, vol 340, p  456).
>
>Basse argues that the distribution of galaxies today could be the  result 
>of
>variations in the density of plasma after the big bang. "I think  it all
>comes from turbulence in the very early universe," he says. "[The  galaxy
>distribution today] is just a blow-up of what was going on at that  point."
>This suggests that stellarator reactors could serve as models of  the early
>universe.
>
>
>But cosmologist Daniel Eisenstein of the  University of Arizona in Tucson,
>who works on the SDSS project, disagrees.  He points out that the kind of
>plasma that Basse describes existed only  for the first millisecond after 
>the
>big bang, and that epoch ended too  soon to influence the large scale
>structure of today's universe.  Eisenstein calculates that the largest
>structure that could have arisen  because of any such primordial density
>variations would only stretch a few  light years across today.
>
>“The plasma created inside fusion reactors is  distributed in a 
>strikingly
>similar way to galaxies in today's  universe”Eisenstein also says that
>Basse's claim is difficult to reconcile  with the results of the Wilkinson
>Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), which  has mapped the distribution of 
>the
>oldest light in the universe dating  back to some 380,000 years after the 
>big
>bang. This "baby picture" of the  cosmos yields markedly different density
>fluctuations to the SDSS map. "I  don't see any way to get turbulence into
>this mix without throwing out all  the [WMAP] data," Eisenstein says. "And
>that's very powerful  data."
>
>From issue 2503 of New Scientist magazine, 11 June 2005, page  8
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>----------
>Howard Bloom
>Author of The Lucifer Principle: A  Scientific Expedition Into the Forces 
>of
>History and Global Brain: The Evolution  of Mass Mind From The Big Bang to 
>the
>21st Century
>Recent Visiting  Scholar-Graduate Psychology Department, New York 
>University;
>Core Faculty  Member, The Graduate  Institute
>www.howardbloom.net
>www.bigbangtango.net
>Founder:  International Paleopsychology Project; founding board member: 
>Epic
>of Evolution  Society; founding board member, The Darwin Project; founder: 
>The
>Big Bang Tango  Media Lab; member: New York Academy of Sciences, American
>Association for the  Advancement of Science, American Psychological 
>Society,
>Academy of Political  Science, Human Behavior and Evolution Society, 
>International
>Society for Human  Ethology; advisory board member: Youthactivism.org;
>executive editor -- New  Paradigm book series.
>For information on The International Paleopsychology  Project, see:
>www.paleopsych.org
>for two chapters from
>The Lucifer  Principle: A Scientific Expedition Into the Forces of History,
>see  www.howardbloom.net/lucifer
>For information on Global Brain: The Evolution of  Mass Mind from the Big
>Bang to the 21st Century, see  www.howardbloom.net
>