The principle of computational equivalence and animism

[Cypress]

Literally the first physicist I know who claims his religion, such as it is, is animism.

Stephen Wolfram is a computer scientist, physicist, and businessman. He is known for his work in computer science, mathematics, and in theoretical physics. By age 14, he had written three books on particle physics. At the age of 15, began research in applied quantum field theory and particle physics and published scientific papers.


Conversation with Stephen Wolfram

Q: Do you believe in God?

Wolfram: Oh, that’s an interesting question. I’m certainly not adherent of any organized religion. However, it’s an interesting question. The things that I’ve done in science tend to intersect in strange ways with things that people have studied in theology for a long time. I mean, for example, it used to be the case. Back in the day, there was this thing that used to be called “The Argument by Design” although that subsequently got a different meaning. It was a question of, look at the universe. The universe could be completely without laws, but actually, that’s not what we see. We see a universe that’s full of definite laws and rules and isn’t as complicated as it could conceivably be. People said, “Okay, that very fact is a proof of the existence of God.”

I guess that since I’m in the business and I happen to be actively starting to work on this again, of trying to find the fundamental theory of physics and believing that that fundamental theory has at least a chance to be simple, then at least by the standards of the early Christian theologians or something, I have to be following the argument by design. In so far as I believe that there’s a simple rule for the universe then their version of an evidence for something – their argument, I would have to say that I subscribe to. When was it? I was visiting some country. Maybe India where they put – on the visa application, they insist that you fill in religion. I was going to put there “animist”. My children said, “Don’t do that. It will just cause trouble.”

Why would I do that? One of the things that is a consequence of a bunch of science that I’ve done is this question of, what has a mind? What things that exist can be thought of as mind-like, like our brains, we attribute minds to. Some version of this is statements like, “The weather has a mind of its own.” The surprising thing that came out of a bunch of science that I did is that – in fact, there’s this principle of computational equivalence that says that in many ways what the weather does it just as mind-like as what brains do. That’s the concept of things like the animistic religions is this idea that there’s spirits in everything so to speak. This notion, does the universe have – is the universe mind-like? This scientific result, this principle of computational equivalence implies that. Following through on that, I kind of have to say at some level that I would be – should be considered by some classification as an animist so to speak.

Q: Have you ever suspected that God exists, or that we live in a simulation?

Wolfram: If by “God” you just mean something beyond science: well, there’s always going to be something beyond science until we have a complete theory of the universe, and even then, we may well still be asking, “Why this universe, and not another?”

What would it mean for us to “live in a simulation”? Maybe that down at the Planck scale we’d find a whole civilization that’s setting things up so our universe works the way it does. Well, the Principle of Computational Equivalence says that the processes that go on at the Planck scale—even if they’re just “physics” ones—are going to be computationally equivalent to lots of other ones, including ones in a “civilization”. So for basically the same reason that it makes sense to say “the weather has a mind of its own”, it doesn’t make any sense to imagine our universe as a “simulation”.

https://www.stephenwolfram.com/quest...-a-simulation/
https://voicesinai.com/episode/voice...ephen-wolfram/

[AProudLefty]

Literally the first physicist I know who claims his religion, such as it is, is animism.

Made me think of that movie, "Avatar". I think the Native Americans had similar beliefs.

[BidenPresident]

I'm good with animism.

[Cypress]

Made me think of that movie, "Avatar". I think the Native Americans had similar beliefs.

Animism and it's belief in spirit beings and spiritual energy pervasive throughout nature, apparently is common among most pre-industrial tribal societies - from indigenous Africans to indigenous people of the Americas.

I believe there are small vestiges of animism still remaining in European societies possibly left over from our pagan roots. Russians have a tradition that when they purchase a new house, they have to let a cat go in the house first, before humans. The cat is supposed to be a spiritual animal, capable of finding the places in the house with good spiritual energy.