[ExI] Many Worlds (was: A Simulation Argument)

[John K Clark]

"Damien Broderick" <thespike at satx.rr.com>

> on the Feynman account (if I've understood it), many 
> components of the supposition meander way the hell
> over the path, and hence should take longer to arrive If each
> of them is "realized" in a different universe, rather than their
> phases canceling, then in most universes a photon should arrive
> at an apparent v < c. No? (Well, obviously no, but why not?)

I think you're mixing Feynman's Sum-over-histories and Everett's many
worlds. Everett was talking about the entire universe splitting, Feynman
was not, Feynman was saying when a charged particle moves from point
A to point B in a electromagnetic field it could move in any conservable
path; but some paths are more likely than others, and if you add up all
those paths in just the right way you will find the path you will probably
observe in the real world. Unlike Everett Feynman wasn't trying to solve 
a philosophical problem, he was trying to get numbers out of a theory so
it can be tested. In that he was certainly successful, his QED theory was
been called the most precise ever devised by the scientific method; 
experiments have confirmed its predictions to eleven decimal points.

Despite this success Feynman, a man not noted for his modesty, 
expressed some concern over QED because it didn't really give a very
clear physical understanding of what was going on. He said:

"I think my theory is simply a way to sweep [mathematical] difficulties
under the rug, I am, of course, not sure of that."

I like another quote of his:

"I think it's fair to say nobody understands quantum mechanics"

 John K Clark