J. Random Universe

[coderman]

‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
On Saturday, September 5, 2020 6:39 PM, Robert Hettinga <hettinga at gmail.com> wrote:

> J. Random Universe
> ...
> It’s all about randomness. It’s now obvious to me that you can’t study infinity without randomness...

consciousness all about randomness as well, or the boundary between entropy and stasis.



> ... I suppose it’s safe to say that since history is the application of a human narrative to previous events, it is an art, and not a science to begin with.

it's interesting to see technology shape the historical narrative. in the past, manipulation oriented around secrecy and falsity. today we see profligacy of falsity - ever harder to find the proverbial needle in the exploding digital haystack!

the digital sea is tailor made for confirmation bias :)



> I have a friend who’s a priest, more fun, a converted Mormon, who has said at least once in public that I’m going to end up a ‘towel-boy in purgatory’ because of my backslid-from-Unitarian-but-declared-anyway metaphysical naturalism.

the mormon religion always struck me as the most "American" belief system: you! can become a god! and procreate with untold spirit wives! populating worlds without number!

  o/~ fatboy slim is fucking in heaven, and fucking and fucking and fucking in heaven ... o/~



> If, like calculus, it hasn’t found it’s epsilons and deltas just yet, relying on infinity as a ‘no matter where you go, there you are’ in answer to ‘why are we here’, is as good a hack as any.

existence - a mystery to everybody!



> Which brings me to the idea of a universal simulation. Without following the turtles all the way down, I’d like to propose a cypherpunk’s solution.
>
> The universe is discovered, not calculated... also, the universe, at the quantum level is random. Incalculable, all the way up, all the way down.

fun developments in this regard:
"Does quantum theory apply at all scales, including that of observers? New light on this fundamental question has recently been shed through a resurgence of interest in the long-standing Wigner’s friend paradox. This is a thought experiment addressing the quantum measurement problem—the difficulty of reconciling the (unitary, deterministic) evolution of isolated systems and the (non-unitary, probabilistic) state update after a measurement. Here, by building on a scenario with two separated but entangled friends introduced by Brukner, we prove that if quantum evolution is controllable on the scale of an observer, then one of ‘No-Superdeterminism’, ‘Locality’ or ‘Absoluteness of Observed Events’—that every observed event exists absolutely, not relatively—must be false."
- https://www.nature.com/articles/s41567-020-0990-x

perhaps entropy invades locality, due to entanglement, throughout the universe?



> If you were to simulate this universe, you would need to simulate randomness. At this point cypherpunks are waving their arms, semaphore, at the back of the room, while real cryptographers smirk in the front row. Pseudorandomness requires a seed. A key. And if you have a key, you can now predict the results of the simulation without having to run it to begin with.
>
> Heh.
>
> Obviously this is wrong, full of amphiboly. But I’m too lazy to think about it now because it’s time for a nap.

a crux here: in cryptography we know that simulations of randomness (or appearance of randomness) are flawed - they do contain the entropy they appear! question becomes: is this flaw exploitable?

using key expansion, we take a small amount of entropy and expand it indefinitely, with the appearance and capability of unknowable-ness. flawed, but not exploitable!

dark energy the cost of key expansion of our universal seed state? perhaps questions of existence to be answered in finding such a secret...


best regards,


P.S. i recently read about a study showing randomness as key to sensor efficacy in low signal environments. it seems nature has long relied on this technique of stochastic resonance to amplify capability!

"""
To make a better sensor, just add noise

by Walt Mills, Pennsylvania State University

Adding noise to enhance a weak signal is a sensing phenomenon common in the animal world but unusual in manmade sensors. Now Penn State researchers have added a small amount of background noise to enhance very weak signals in a light source too dim to sense.

In contrast to most sensors, for which noise is a problem that should be suppressed, they found that adding just the right amount of background noise can actually increase a signal too weak for sensing by normal sensors, to a level that can reach detectability.

Although their sensor, based on a two-dimensional material called molybdenum disulfide, detects light, the same principle can be used to detect other signals, and because it requires very little energy and space compared to conventional sensors, could find wide adaptation in the coming Internet of Things (IoT). IoT will deploy tens of millions of sensors to monitor conditions in the home and factories, and low energy requirements would be a strong bonus.

"This phenomenon is something that is frequently seen in nature," says Saptarshi Das, an assistant professor of engineering science and mechanics. "For example, a paddlefish that lives in muddy waters cannot actually find its food, which is a phytoplankton called Daphnia, by sight. The paddlefish has electroreceptors that can pick up very weak electric signal from the Daphnia at up to 50 meters. If you add a little bit of noise, it can find the Daphnia at 75 meters or even 100 meters. This ability adds to the evolutionary success of this animal."

Another interesting example is the jewel beetle, which can detect a forest fire at 50 miles distance. The most advanced infrared detector can only detect at 10 to 20 miles. This is due to a phenomenon these animals use called stochastic resonance.

"Stochastic resonance is a phenomenon where a weak signal which is below the detection threshold of a sensor can be detected in the presence of a finite and appropriate amount of noise," according to Akhil Dodda, a graduate student in engineering science and mechanics and co-first author on a new paper appearing this week in Nature Communications.

In their paper, the researchers demonstrate the first use of this technique to detect a subthreshold photonic signal.

One possible use being considered is for troops in combat. Army personnel in the field already carry very bulky equipment. It is unfeasible to add the heavy, power-hungry equipment required to enhance a subthreshold signal. Their technique is also applicable in resource-constrained environments or beneath the ocean where people want to monitor very weak signals. It could also be used in volcanic locations or to monitor earthquakes in time to give an alarm.

"Who would have thought that noise could play a constructive role in signal detection? We have challenged tradition to detect otherwise undetectable signals with miniscule energy consumption. This can open doors to a totally unexplored and ignored field of noise enhanced signal detection," said Aaryan Oberoi, a graduate student from the Department of Engineering Science and Mechanics and co-first author on the paper.

Their next step is to demonstrate this technique on a silicon photodiode, which would make the device very scalable. Any state-of-the art sensor can be enhanced by this concept, Das says.
"""
- https://phys.org/news/2020-09-sensor-noise.html