I just started reading Tom Siegfried’s “The Bit and The Pendulum” recently, and unlike most books, this one starts off with a big idea. A really good idea. That idea is as follows: since the dawn of science, way back in the 1500’s or so, our scientists have tended to use practical mechanical items as a metaphor for understanding what they are studying. And what they are studying is the world. Individual scientists usually don’t study the world as a whole; they pick a particular subject, e.g. rocks or heat or chemicals or stars or butterflies, etc. But they usually need a “meta-theory” of reality to fit their discoveries and immediate theories into. It’s that meta-theory that Siegfried says usually comes from observing an important practical tool.
Siegfried cites clocks as having a lot of influence upon Isaac Newton’s physics. The operation of a clock hints at the orderly direction and use of force. Newton found the math to express what the clock seemed to be doing (the fact that a clock needs numbers certainly didn’t hurt Newton in his determination that math was needed to describe what was going on). A hundred or so years after Newton, the steam engine probably influenced scientists, especially in the field of thermodynamics. The steam engine helped them to abstract Newton’s ideas regarding force into the somewhat more abstract concept of energy. Siegfried then jumps to the present, with computers as a metaphor for information. And thus you now see a lot of speculation about information as the ultimate grounding of reality and the universe as one big computer. Siegfried’s book talks about this, but you can find others. E.g., Seth Lloyd’s “Programming the Universe”.
Siegfried has bigger fish to fry in his book, but I think this is a really interesting idea. He doesn’t develop too many other examples of abstract theories stemming from practical machinery, although he does leave behind one good one: the science that led to the computer was conceptualized in the early 20th century around the typewriter!
So what else can we do with this idea? How about Einstein? What machines helped to shape his ground-breaking concepts regarding the unity of space, time, mass, gravity and energy? I would venture to say that the railroad train played a big role (the train being a further development of the steam engine). How about quantum theory in the early 20th century? I’m out on a limb here, but perhaps the revolutionary concept that energy and matter come in irreducible “quanta” was helped along by the many factories and production lines of the time, which cranked out thousands and millions of standardized products, all of the same size and shape. As to the random, dancing behavior of quantum particles, perhaps the scientific realization that the micro world behaved so strangely was assisted by the area of industrial statistics and quality control, which dealt with the fact that industrial production lines actually were not perfect; their behaviors and outputs were subject to random factors that were describable (on a higher level) by Bell curves.
And if you go way back to the days before science, you can still see human technology at work in the metaphysician’s attempt to make sense of the universe. For example, the ship figures largely in some ancient descriptions of how our world relates to other worlds, such as heaven and hell. Go back to Genesis and Adam and Eve – the writer there may have been thinking about another human artifact, i.e. the farm, specifically the orchard. The universe is a big farm where crops and trees are arranged by plots. Don’t cross over to that particular plot at harvest time, or something bad’s gonna happen.
I always enjoy a big, simple and new idea, especially if helps you to focus things a bit. I think Siegfried has a good one here, so I’m happy to share it today.
Jim, Well, I can’t really say that machines as such do much for me. Perhaps relating to machines is a masculine thing–like naming one’s car and treating it like a person. That type of thing is just not in my realm of thought.
However, I do have some comments on some points in your blog. But once again, my comments are in “left field” from where you are. I see physics in a much different light from your view. It will quickly become evident that I am not a physicist, so perhaps I should simply say “no comment.” However, I have done some reading of popular books on physics over the last 25 or so years. Frankly, I think that physics is close to philosophy. I think that what physicists do is think of what it is they are looking for; that is, they say, well, if this is the situation here, then we should expect thus and so to be there. Then they go looking for it. It always takes them quite a few years before they “find” what it is they are looking for.
So, what they actually do is conceive an idea–very close to philosophy; I think that their looking brings the “thing” they are looking for into existence. Similar to ideas. I have always thought the idea was the most powerful force in the world because if someone thinks of an idea–whatever it is, it is only a matter of time until the idea becomes a reality.
Applying this to physics, it then seems to me that “humans” become creators. Perhaps WE are God. Now won’t that put the atheists in a bind. Think of it: If WE turn out to be God, then how can atheists deny the existence of themselves.
On antoher topic: I have never liked the Bell curve. Sure, statisticians have always touted it as the “only” way things seem to gather themselves into some kind of order. However, I’ve always thought there was something wrong with the concept as it always “dumbs things down.” Most likely this comes from my almost four decades of teaching, where the first question I often heard was: “Are you going to grade on a curve?” The answer was always a resounding “ABSOLUTELY NOT.” Talk about “dumbing things down”–grading on a curve basically told the students: “You don’t have to study very hard” and “The one who does study hard makes it difficult for everybody else. So keep the knowledge level low.” Actually, when one thinks of it, (here I borrow from Nasim Taleb’s THE BLACK SWAN) all the really important “things” come from the “ends” of the Bell curve, from the extremes of the standard deviations.
As to the universe being “a big computer”: I can see everything being reduced to math but reducing everything to one and zero seems a bit much to me.
Sorry to disagree with you on all these points…but I can’t help myself. Siegfried’s book–I can’t say that I’d be as enamoured of it as you are. But then again, its the diversity of people that makes everything interesting.
MCS
Comment by Anonymous — November 25, 2007 @ 2:21 pm
Jim, Well, I can’t really say that machines as such do much for me. Perhaps relating to machines is a masculine thing–like naming one’s car and treating it like a person. That type of thing is just not in my realm of thought.
However, I do have some comments on some points in your blog. But once again, my comments are in “left field” from where you are. I see physics in a much different light from your view. It will quickly become evident that I am not a physicist, so perhaps I should simply say “no comment.” However, I have done some reading of popular books on physics over the last 25 or so years. Frankly, I think that physics is close to philosophy. I think that what physicists do is think of what it is they are looking for; that is, they say, well, if this is the situation here, then we should expect thus and so to be there. Then they go looking for it. It always takes them quite a few years before they “find” what it is they are looking for.
So, what they actually do is conceive an idea–very close to philosophy; I think that their looking brings the “thing” they are looking for into existence. Similar to ideas. I have always thought the idea was the most powerful force in the world because if someone thinks of an idea–whatever it is, it is only a matter of time until the idea becomes a reality.
Applying this to physics, it then seems to me that “humans” become creators. Perhaps WE are God. Now won’t that put the atheists in a bind. Think of it: If WE turn out to be God, then how can atheists deny the existence of themselves.
On antoher topic: I have never liked the Bell curve. Sure, statisticians have always touted it as the “only” way things seem to gather themselves into some kind of order. However, I’ve always thought there was something wrong with the concept as it always “dumbs things down.” Most likely this comes from my almost four decades of teaching, where the first question I often heard was: “Are you going to grade on a curve?” The answer was always a resounding “ABSOLUTELY NOT.” Talk about “dumbing things down”–grading on a curve basically told the students: “You don’t have to study very hard” and “The one who does study hard makes it difficult for everybody else. So keep the knowledge level low.” Actually, when one thinks of it, (here I borrow from Nasim Taleb’s THE BLACK SWAN) all the really important “things” come from the “ends” of the Bell curve, from the extremes of the standard deviations.
As to the universe being “a big computer”: I can see everything being reduced to math but reducing everything to one and zero seems a bit much to me.
Sorry to disagree with you on all these points…but I can’t help myself. Siegfried’s book–I can’t say that I’d be as enamoured of it as you are. But then again, its the diversity of people that makes everything interesting.
MCS
Comment by Anonymous — November 25, 2007 @ 2:21 pm