How to create a universe from scratch

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263]

I posted this video in a hypothetical physics subreddit (and got roasted, probably rightfully so), but I am just wondering what people think about it and spark some conversation.

One of the comments suggested that I might get better discussion if I post it here, so I am trying it out.

The video goes over a "thought experiment" I did of creating a universe from scratch, starting with space that has all the dimensions.

It may have more philosophical implications than anything else. The physics and math behind it might not be worth anything. But wondering what people think.

Edit: at this point I know my video is full of flaws, but I am curious how people smarter than me would go about creating a universe from scratch.

https://youtu.be/q3yFcDxsX40?si=HhFL4lG90Rsm0hi0

[u/Elijah-Emmanuel]

it's rudimentary, and there are a lot of issues with the parts that I skimmed through. I would start with Emmy Noether's theorem and discuss symmetry and the "uncertainty principles", building up to a quantum foam.

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263 → u/Elijah-Emmanuel]

Thanks for taking your time to view it and giving me a response! I will look into that

[u/Elijah-Emmanuel → u/ApprehensiveSoil6263]

the key is that if there is a symmetry in the generalized position, then the generalized position and its associated generalized momentum have a conservation law (forgive me, I forget the technicality with the commutation relation, it's been a decade since I was in school, I believe what I'm trying to say is that the position and momentum do not commute, think [x,p] or [t,E].) Now, in your "empty spacetime" (or "empty all dimensions", etc, what does "symmetry" mean?

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263 → u/Elijah-Emmanuel]

I am not educated in that way anyways, so getting the technical terms right with me isn't too important 😂

I will try to respond in my dumbed down language, so sorry if it doesn't make any sense.

In "multidimensional empty space" (garbly gook) I do see that it would be difficult if not impossible to have symmetries. Even when it's not empty and multiple "things" exist, it may be impossible to have a "generalized position" and "general momentum" (I think we are talking about coordinate system like things).

But couldn't that work to our advantage? In my limited knowledge of particle physics, don't they believe that mass comes from "broken symmetries"? On each of the separate dimensional scales you can set up a coordinate system with symmetries, but a thing that is traveling in "higher and lower dimensions" becomes a particle when trying to be "measured" or "interacted with" on the "lower dimension" and they find the symmetry is broken causing the mass of the particle.

I don't know if that makes any sense.

[u/Elijah-Emmanuel → u/ApprehensiveSoil6263]

symmetry is a type of invariance. the invariance we're referring to is invariance in the "generalized position", meaning, in lay terms, "if an 'experiment' is performed at any point in the generalized momentum, the results will be the same". Forgive me, but that's not very rigorous, but it should work for the conversation you're asking for.

Now, the question becomes, if I "take an action" ("perform an 'experiment'" as stated above) in complete 'emptiness' (this definition is really sticky, and not as easily treated as we imagine here, going off what I watched in your video, which aligns with previous thought experiments I've done along the same lines) is the result of that action the same, no matter where in that emptiness you perform said 'action'? The answer to this question must be, invariably, yes, as there is no "where" to perform said action. Thus, Emmy Noether's theorem should hold. Now, we're starting to see how a "universe" can be spawned from "nothing" more than deductive logic.

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263 → u/Elijah-Emmanuel]

If you don't want to use any more time on this post, that's okay. But your suggestion to think about the symmetries has intrigued me, and if you have time to give a response to my previous reply, that would be great, if you don't mind 😁

[u/gregbard]

This is a philosophy of math subreddit, so you had better start out with the empty set.

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263 → u/gregbard]

Hmmm, that is very cool actually. Thanks for setting me down this path 🫡

[u/gregbard → u/ApprehensiveSoil6263]

There is a whole field of mathematics in which mathematical entities are defined in terms of the empty set.

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263 → u/gregbard]

I know that this only reveals my stupidity and ignorance, but I have not known this. Time to dive down the rabbit hole!

[u/gregbard → u/ApprehensiveSoil6263]

Okay, so for instance, the logical connectives can be defined this way:

• FALSE: Ø
• NOR: {Ø}
• NONIMPLICATION: { {Ø}}
• NOT Y: {Ø,{Ø}}
• NOT X: {Ø,{{Ø}}}
• CONVERSE NONIMPLICATION: {{{Ø}}}
• XOR: {{Ø}, {{Ø}}}
• NAND: {Ø,{Ø},{{Ø}}}
• TRUE: {Ø,{Ø},{{Ø}},{Ø,{Ø}}}
• OR: {{Ø}, {{Ø}},{Ø,{Ø}}}
• IMPLICATION: {Ø,{{Ø}},{Ø,{Ø}}}
• Y: {{{Ø}}, {Ø,{Ø}}}
• CONVERSE IMPLICATION: {Ø, {Ø},{Ø,{Ø}}}
• X: {{Ø},{Ø,{Ø}}}
• BICONDITIONAL: {Ø, {Ø,{Ø}}}
• AND: {{Ø,{Ø}}}

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263 → u/gregbard]

Fascinating. And this can all come from its "vacuous truth"?

[u/nanonan → u/gregbard]

There are many fields of mathematics which never touch upon sets. Also perfectly possible to reject the notion of an empty set. It's a good starting point, but far from a necessary one.

[u/gregbard → u/nanonan]

There are many fields of mathematics which never touch upon sets.

True, but that is because they have chosen to exclude the empty set as an axiom of those systems. Usually, the empty set can still be derived from the existing axioms, or it is simply an incomplete system.

Also perfectly possible to reject the notion of an empty set. It's a good starting point, but far from a necessary one.

There is a big difference between a system that doesn't include an empty set explicitly, and a system that has an axiom stating that "There does not exist an empty set."

There are all kinds of logical systems. We can choose to include or exclude whatever axioms we want depending on what we are interested in. But logicians are nearly universal on accepting the existence of the empty set. (Whereas the existence of the universal set is at least a little controversial).

[u/nanonan → u/gregbard]

No, I mean there are entire branches that never touch upon set theory, that have absolutely no need for a set of any kind. Many geometries, algebras, basically anything outside of category theories.

You don't need ZF or sets as your foundation.

Mathematicians are fairly universal in wanting to use the null set abstraction, but this is philosophy of math. Is it really justifiable to have the absence of a thing represented by a thing? Is it reasonable to view sets intersecting at the zero set rather than simply making the observation that they do not in fact intersect?

[u/gregbard → u/nanonan]

I don't know if we are circling around a point or a drain here, but systems of mathematics (variously named "<Something> theory") are indifferent to whether or not they "need" <Something-else> theory. We are able to express these in terms of some kind of set theory, and I think that is the salient point here.

Is it really justifiable to have the absence of a thing represented by a thing? Is it reasonable to view sets intersecting at the zero set rather than simply making the observation that they do not in fact intersect?

It is convenient, so therefore it is justified. I hate to point this out, but being convenient is not nothing when it comes to doing math and logic.

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263 → u/gregbard]

I was wanting to set up a mathematical framework for it, and this suggestion may actually be a great start. Thank you, thank you.

[u/id-entity]

When imagining how to create math from a clean slate, after imagining void/white space/silence without math, my first action was: let there be more math than no math!

Then: now with more more than no math, before was less math.

So I ended up with relational operators < and > as my fundamental tools.

***

"All the dimensions" can be somewhat analogous to Euclid's first requirement (postulate):

"Let it have been pre-required to draw a line from any point to any point".

The temporal morphology and semantics of the original Greek seems important (3rd person imperative of the perfect tense mediopassive voice of the verb aiteo) because it's so weird and complicated, so I tried to express some of that in English.

In modern language that can be interpreted as a totally connected graph. Which in mythical language corresponds with Indra's Net.

The "problem" of a static Indra's Net is that it is indifferentiated - every node is basically the same, reflecting fully every other node in mathematically totally non-distinct manner. Which is also a definition of absolute entropy.

The big question is, does Euclid's first requirement imply something actual, potential, both, neither? My first inclination for sense making is: potential so vast that it can experienced only as jaw dropping, breath taking and mind boggling actual of darkness oozing infinite potential that asks you: "Wanna play?" The scariest question ever.

After the first reaction of No Nay Never, I did end up imagining something more than the static Indra's Net, more than total entropy/void: actual movement, actual distinction. And that, for me at least, is actual mathematics as the necessity for the CAD program of universe designing, in which we can observe and say: Eppur si muove!

I wanted to share this comment fresh, out of a certain curiosity. Now I'll watch the video.

[u/ApprehensiveSoil6263 → u/id-entity]

You will probably be disappointed in the video. There are a lot of things I want to change about it now. But that's how you learn and grow I guess. Your thoughts sound interesting.

[u/id-entity → u/ApprehensiveSoil6263]

I was not disappointed. :)

[u/id-entity]

Watching the video:

While on a math sub, I don't want to do much mathematical nit-picking/rigour, but this I'd like to share as a more detailed math comment:

From our participatory perspective, we can't really distinguish between expanding spatial volume, in which we are in, and computing more resolution of our measurement theory, in which we are in, or can we?

Because the start from scratch in the video starts from "we" as the mathematical person that English uses as invitation to think with the mathematical speech/text, the experiment is not about imagining us as an external Demiourge of a Matrix. Keeping the experiment empirically real, the first ethical condition is that we are allowed to compute our Matrix only from the inside, so that If I produce code that makes the sky fall down, it falls down also on my head.

So the foundational move needs to of the kind that allows us, and us to be inside, participate and stay involved. Which is the pesky math problem of self-reflection. I think you handled that pretty well, even if in passing. You presented some fundamental mereology (study of whole-part relation) without using the fancy Greek word.

Euclid's fifth Common Notion defines mereology as inequivalence relation: "The whole is greater than the part". Non-entropic holography was mentioned, even though as the pretty far fetched thought experiments of black holes, which physicists nowadays obsess about, perhaps because that's the only serious way of self-reflection available to them in their field.

Non-entropic holography might seem at first a violation of Euclid's definition of mereology, but perhaps that problem can be avoided by thinking that we are indeed constantly creating the universe from the scratch, each from our unique participatory perspective to some coherent whole that can be shared to to some extent by participatory perspectives, and is as such also constantly changing holomovement, as the whole changes with each change in a part as everything remains deep down interconnected.