From Russia with awe and wonder: Cosmism
Also: Frank Tipler's Omega Point cosmology, superdeterminism.
Greetings to all readers and subscribers, and special greetings to the paid subscribers!
Please scroll down for the main topic of this newsletter. But first:
I found a 1995 review of Frank Tipler’s Omega Point cosmology by John Polkinghorne, the physicist/theologian who passed away last year. One of my heroes criticizing another! “Tipler develops his arguments with fantastic ingenuity,” said Polkinghorne. “The book reads like the highest class of science fiction… a remarkable speculative tour de force…”
Polkinghorne summarized Tipler’s theory as:
“the collapse of a closed universe subject to a specific future boundary condition which, roughly speaking, requires the causal network of the universe to condense onto a single ultimate point. This is the Omega Point, which Tipler says plays the role of a ‘physical god’ in the new-style religion. In this closing hectic phase, the whole cosmos will become a computer racing at ever increasing speeds, capable of processing an infinite amount of information and so, in Tipler’s view, capable of producing ‘eternal life’… the Omega Point will use its infinite computing capacity to produce emulations of you and me.”
But (besides other objections) Polkinghorne was persuaded that the “hope of such a resurrection lies not in the curiosity or calculation of a cosmic computer, but in the personal God who cares individually for each of His human creatures.”
I take a middle of the road position. I don’t buy Tipler’s “extreme reductionism” and staunch determinism, but I think a revised theory could show that the Omega Point is very similar to Polkinghorne’s personal God.
I have been going through Tipler’s “The Physics of Immortality” again. For those who don’t have the book there is a decently formatted html version online (too bad the appendices for scientists are missing). I still agree with all I wrote in Chapter 15 - Omega Point: Frank Tipler’s physics of immortality and Christianity of my book “Tales of the Turing Church,” and I still characterize my position as “Soft Tiplerianism.”
Stimulated by a video produced by Sabine Hossenfelder and titled “Does Superdeterminism save Quantum Mechanics? Or does it kill free will and destroy science?” (text version), I have been thinking of determinism again. Is everything predetermined, or does the universe make choices? Do WE make free choices? Am I writing this sentence, or was it already written at the beginning of time? These are, I often think, THE most important open scientific questions.
Hossenfelder is a great science communicator. See my review of her book “Lost in math: how beauty leads physics astray” (2018). I’m impatiently waiting for her next book “Existential Physics.” Great title! But superdeterminism doesn’t make existential sense to me.
I discuss superdeterminism in my book “Tales of the Turing Church.” The “super” prefix is redundant: superdeterminism is just determinism. I’m not blind to the esthetic and emotional appeal of a fully deterministic universe, but my existential preference goes to a creative universe where genuinely new things happen and we are autonomous agents with free will.
Hossenfelder quotes Nicolas Gisin, who summarizes my own position as:
“for me, the situation is very clear: not only does free will exist, but it is a prerequisite for science, philosophy, and our very ability to think rationally in a meaningful way. Without free will, there could be no rational thought. As a consequence, it is quite simply impossible for science and philosophy to deny free will.”
Having said that, I’m thinking of how to make existential peace with the idea of a deterministic universe. Perhaps Wolfram’s ideas on computational irreducibility? Unpredictable determinism seems equivalent to God’s transcendent knowledge of a future that is unknowable to us (even in principle), so if you have no problem with the latter you should have no problem with the former.
This is similar to what C. S. Lewis said on God and time (see also my essay “Time beyond time, out of time”):
“He does not ‘foresee’ you doing things tomorrow; He simply sees you doing them: because, though tomorrow is not yet there for you, it is for Him. You never supposed that your actions at this moment were any less free because God knows what you are doing. Well, He knows your tomorrow’s actions in just the same way—because He is already in tomorrow and can simply watch you. In a sense, He does not know your action till you have done it: but then the moment at which you have done it is already ‘Now’ for Him.”
I’m not persuaded, but I’m thinking. Some of my pet ideas (e.g. all information on everything that ever happens is permanently stored in the fabric of reality) are easier to defend with superdeterminism. I’m thinking of how to harmonize the two perspectives. Gisin has interesting ideas. More soon.
An interesting article by Michel Eltchaninoff, titled “Transhumanisme. Retour vers le futURSS” (unpaywalled copy here) and published in Philosophie magazine, promotes Eltchaninoff’s new book titled “Lénine a marché sur la lune: La folle histoire des cosmistes et transhumanistes russes.”
Eltchaninoff argues that Russian cosmism is a precursor of contemporary transhumanism, and elaborates on modern cosmism. The cosmist idea that we will expand into the universe and become cosmic engineers has inspired and continues to inspire futurists (both thinkers and doers) in both Russia and the West. The article also mentions a new French translation of Nikolai Fedorov’s masterwork: “Philosophie de l'oeuvre commune.”
See Chapter 7 of my book and my recent review of “The Future of Immortality: Remaking Life and Death in Contemporary Russia” by Anya Bernstein.
Last year I exchanged emails with the editors of Philosophie magazine. This is quoted in the article:
“Russian cosmism and transhumanism are very close. Transhumanism inherits from Russian cosmism a deep conviction that we'll advance beyond all limits, expand into space, and resurrect the dead from the past using future science and technology.”
I also told them:
Technological resurrection is not emphasized by many contemporary transhumanists because (and this is a major difference) many transhumanists reject the religious outlook that was central to the thought of Nikolai Fedorov and many Russian cosmists.
From Chapter 10 of my book: “Harrison... concludes that the United States has its counterpart to Russian cosmism, for which no term seems more appropriate than American cosmism...” The first wave of transhumanists in the USA (FM 2030, Max More, etc.) were aware of Russian cosmism but didn't emphasize its more visionary aspects, like technological resurrection. I have stopped using the term "transhumanism" to describe my worldview, now I use "cosmism" instead.
The writings of the Russian cosmists were not available in translation in the 1980/90s when contemporary transhumanism was developed, but second hand accounts were circulated in the futurist community and, I think, influenced Max and other early transhumanists. Max says: “One of the more interesting precursors to transhumanism was Nikolai Fedorovich Fedorov (1829-1903), a Russian Orthodox Christian philosopher and participant in the Russian cosmism movement, who advocated using scientific methods to achieve radical life extension, physical immortality, resurrection of the dead...”
From Chapter 7 of my book: “Goffman and Cornell note that the term ‘cosmism’ was ‘borrowed by Ben Goertzel and Giulio Prisco in 2010 to denote a futurist philosophy more tailored for the modern era...’” There is a modern form of cosmism, but it's not an organized group. There have been attempts to establish organized cosmism (e.g. from my book, Chapter 7: “In 2015 I participated in a conference on ‘Modern Cosmism’ in New York City, organized by Vlad Bowen. George Carey and Ben Goertzel were among the participants. The conference was covered by novelist John Crowley...”) but no followup. I guess cosmists are too individualistic to form groups.
Hello! Subscribed because of this mutual citing of Frank Tipler and Nikolai Fyodorov. I will be interested to see what you are thinking about these topics now. One tie-in to a recent post that I noticed was your grappling here with determinism, wanting free will. In your paper on Jorjani you mention that we may simply participate in whatever divine will may be said to exist.
As an aside, I'm curious also what you think of the point that language cannot capture... anything, really. I am thinking of Budhadasa's talk "there is no religion," but the same think could be said many ways. One possible overlap I'm thinking of now is that Fyodorov mentions that we may resurrect the dead through what we may call psychic powers as opposed to through the usage of technology. The limitations of technology vs. whatever would lead to psychic powers may resemble the limits of language itself.
Anyway, on the topic of determinism, I am enjoying thinking of the beginning and ending of all timelines as being be same. I have been reading about the Big Bounce theory of cosmology, where a big bang happens after a preceding big crunch. For me, the same old question arises at a higher level: why is this universe, or that one, the one repeating over and over again?
I'm currently imagining what we might consider the beginning and end of time to be this superposition of all possible states of affairs. The big "everything-nothing," as it were, and this would have something to do with what we've been calling "God." If you look at Jewish theology, the notion that the highest God cannot be spoken of, is ultimately beyond, etc., is a striking point of resonance. Ties into the language point above, motivating apophatism.
So, let's imagine that you are given a task: you receive a story fragment where the beginning and ending are set, but you get the job of deciding how it gets there. This would basically be the logic of an "attractor" as I see it.
When it comes to grounding this discussion in practical affairs, I think we see "attractors" at work in activities that everyone seems to come to participate in. People may disagree about many things politically and so on, but there is not widespread disagreement that it is desirable to be able to eat, to remove bodily waste. There are not people protesting that they don't want to sleep and so they shouldn't be forced to do so.
This is a basic level where there are things we all have to take for granted because anything we do abstracts over them. This is also of course a domain that any modification of the body would go to. Removing the necessity to eat, for people to carry babies to term inside their bodies, removing the necessity to sleep, these are all things which can easily come to seem desirable and are simulated in small doses already. Examples: intravenous nutrient supply, surrogacy, stimulants or other chemicals used to keep people alert.
Another way of getting at what I mean is that certain things are predictable. Money is an attractor. People usually don't complain that they have to use money. They just want more. Then, given that someone gets more money than before, there are obvious things they might do. They might buy different food, get nicer clothes, move, find different friends, and so on. These are kinds of "attractors," where you feel like you are following your free will yet you are glomming onto the same set of desirable things as everyone.
This might be related to the idea of higher-order pleasures, or moral development in general. It's like we are always optimizing, always trying to live perfectly, yet we inherit a mechanism which is executing a certain optimization function over a certain perceived space.
For example, for many of us (myself included, I am no master meditator), we are optimizing over a three-or-four dimensional space: our experience of 3D reality, and 4D because we're invested in "arcs." Yet if "reality" is really happening in more than that, even infinite dimensions, then it's obvious that our attempts to improve will be frustrated.
That's where we are stuck in a "local minimum," where we think we found the best answer, but really perhaps the topology is not there. It's a similar dynamic to the demiurge who confuses themselves with "the real God."
For example, you are standing on a tall pillar. Below you is a nice place, the garden of Eden or something. You tell yourself how wise you are that you do not go there, since you'd have to jump and you would die. The best choice is to stay on the pillar. No question. There is an element of sour grapes here as well. Not only is it right for you to stay on the pillar now, but actually the pillar is just better than the garden anyway. Then, all of a sudden there are stairs. Yet you still don't go down, since now you've convinced yourself that your perceived best option at one time is your best option in all cases.
What there is to do with language is perhaps simply to build such stairs, or get people to see the stairs that are there. Or simply to see that the pillar is the garden. Who knows?
The point about the attractors was simply that people may be free to do what they please, yet this may yield consistent patterns not just in established pleasures, but also ones to come.
This point is germane to the other comment discussion, where you say that people will change their tune when life extension does something. That is because extended the lifespan is such an obvious thing for people to desire. We can all have "free will," but if we all got three wishes, we might use two of them for the same things.
Immortality, infinite money? Or then we can get into the superpowers.
The difference is that we're opening onto a scenario where more than one person will get these advantages at the same time. Or, the machinic type of being will attain to them before we ever do. It will be the one that doesn't have to sleep, that doesn't die, etc.
This then opens onto the question of resurrecting the dead, and what this could have to do with an attractor point at the end of time.
I am basically trying to say that raising the dead would seem to be an obvious thing to do, along the lines of improving your diet if you go from broke to having tons of money. Perhaps in this case we can even stake an optimism that a machinic being would want to do this as well.
Where I'm not so sure about Tipler is that they are saying that limitless computation will lead to the simulation of all sorts of possibilities. This intrigues me, since I'm imagining the tendency at the end of time for things to tend in precisely this direction, becoming more and more similar to the superposition of all states of affairs in the Omega Point at the beginning/end of time.
Yet as someone carrying a torch for Fyodorov, and because I like the idea, I'm not satisfied with resurrecting the copy of someone who died. No, it has to be "them." But then I'm thinking, taking into account quantum mechanics, there might be several "versions" of a person that died. The problem is that, even allowing for the conceit, it becomes difficult to define what "resurrecting the dead" means.
Another way of getting to a similar place is that people would want to visit "a world" where something had gone differently in their past. This is another "attractor" point, since this sort of thing is something everyone thinks about. What might have been?
Between these two things, we're discussing engagement with "the dead" along with engagement with other possible renditions of one's life. So, we're talking about powerful technology in the future, yet we're then cast back into the past and into all possibilities.
One striking idea to me would be that, if there is such an attractor in motivation, then different groups from different "dimensions" would all have the same idea: to bridge between these possibilities. Obviously, I am spitballing amateurishly here.
Yet, for me the secret might be that we never "really left" the Omega Point. It will be possible for all of these "possible timelines" to bleed into each other, so that we need not only reckon with our own high technology, but that of every possible universe, with every single effort having similar motivations and apprehensions. What if the other timelines want to kill us? And so on.
I'm intrigued by all of this because I still can't shake the thought of: why is exactly *this* happening, and not something else? All these ideas don't really answer that question, but I do hope to offer you something about determinism versus free will.
Which, to recapitulate, is simply that we may have free will, yet certain things may be so obviously desirable that they act as "attractors." This even happens in a meta way, so people glom onto one set of "normal" things, and then some people go screw that and become "punks." Or some people go look at all those conformist punks and go on to get into religion and philosophy and niche politics. All of these things are sort of obvious things to do.
If that's the case, and basically anyone with access to "God tech" would do such things--any maybe even the "God tech" would do them itself anyway--then these sorts of eventualities can act as "attractors." It's not that you have to be controlled in everything you do, but rather that things are going to wind up going to the same place in the end no matter what happens.
As an artist, it brings up for me the question of style. It's not what do we want to achieve, but how do we want to achieve it? Maybe this could help us in our conflicts. We want the same things, yet are locked in perceptions of what it takes to achieve them. I think we have to confront the weirdness of engaging with "the Omega Point," that we only make sense in the context of everything else. And then who knows?
Excited to see if you have any thoughts on all this!
and while some individual will changs mind with evidence, my previous comment stems that most will not, unless some extraordinary discovery is made soon and I am not betting on it.