Weird how magic and mystery stops being magic when scientists have words for it.
One day we’ll discover the afterlife, but we’ll just call them “Post-Human Conciousness Wells” or something, and insist it totally isn’t the same thing as that ancient superstition.
Cmon, you wanna tell me the world is purely material when our math literally uses imaginary numbers to make sense of things?
Imaginary numbers are merely a poorly named mathematical construct used to reconcile the empirically observable phenomena of nature (e.g., summations of waves). They’re the means by which we achieve mathematical closure under exponentiation. You could call them whatever the F you want, so long as they could be used to represent vectors in the complex plane.
What reason do you have to believe in anything outside of material nature?
Up to the introduction of quantum mechanics imaginary numbers where only ever a theoretical tool and any calculation in electromagnetism, mechanics or even relativity can be done without them.
Also, any measurement you can make will always result in real numbers because there is no logical interpretation for imaginary measurements (a speed of 2+i m/s doesnt really make sense)
I said that any calculation in electrodynamics CAN be done without imaginary numbers, I never said that it would be the most common or convenient way of doing things.
If you use a different form of solution to maxwells equations, electrical impedance can totally be expressed as just another real property. Fourier transform also is not necessary to solve maxwells equations or any other physical systems. It just might make it significantly easier and more convenient.
Obviously imaginary numbers existed and where used way before quantum mechanics was a thing but they werent technically necessary in physics because they never appeared in the equations of fundamental theories (Maxwells equations, general relativity, newtonian mechanics)
I was just trying to make an argument that imaginary numbers were technically not necessary and thus it makes historical sense that they werent seen as something ‘real’. Im not trying to get people to stop using them ;)
Well, in AC circuits, having √3̅+√-̅1̅ A of current makes as much sense as having 2 amps with a 30° phase shift. It’s just easier notation for calculations - Cartesian coordinates for what would otherwise be polar.
That’s BS notation. If you want Cartesian, just use 3i+1j, no need for some impossible √-1 that you then redefine some operations for, just so it becomes orthogonal to R.
You might want to look up geometric algebra for a better geometric interpretation of complex numbers than the complex plane with a “real” and “imaginary” axis
There’s a really good science fiction novel by Robert Sheckley called Immortality, Inc. where scientists in the future have discovered that there is an afterlife, but the only way to ensure you get there is a medical procedure and you can only do that if you can afford it. That’s just the beginning, there’s a huge amount of worldbuilding, but that’s the main theme of the book.
actual theoretical physicist here: “imaginary numbers” are just poorly named, there’s nothing imaginary about them. You might as well use 2D geometric algebra to do the exact same job (treating real numbers as scalars and imaginary numbers as pseudoscalars)
Friend of mine (who is dead now ironically enough, and damn, I miss him), wrote a story about this. Where the dead show up on some random planet in the Andromeda Galaxy, in their prime, one that’s infinitely large and does the minecraft thing where it generates as you go, and contains the means to do pretty much anything except for leave… with them just showing up in the Capital City of the planet if they die again, which cannot be done of natural causes here.
The dead initially think it’s Heaven, but then they notice “Heaven” is being powered by a Dyson Sphere, eventually they connect enough of the dots to realize that their world is a simulation.
The protagonist is the grandchild of one of the deceased who wound up here after testing experimental teleportation technology, turns out the simulation brought him there to inform him why teleportation technology shouldn’t be invented.
Eventually the grandchild goes back to Earth, agreeing to keep this a secret, for fear that if people knew about this it would create “Dyson Sphere cults” and would encourage people to commit mass suicide, just “dying to get there”
My thought was more like, then there must be god, that god must have been created (since not naturally developed) so he must be there for a reason (administrator or something) so there must be a system behind it.
Weird how magic and mystery stops being magic when scientists have words for it.
One day we’ll discover the afterlife, but we’ll just call them “Post-Human Conciousness Wells” or something, and insist it totally isn’t the same thing as that ancient superstition.
Cmon, you wanna tell me the world is purely material when our math literally uses imaginary numbers to make sense of things?
Imaginary numbers are merely a poorly named mathematical construct used to reconcile the empirically observable phenomena of nature (e.g., summations of waves). They’re the means by which we achieve mathematical closure under exponentiation. You could call them whatever the F you want, so long as they could be used to represent vectors in the complex plane.
What reason do you have to believe in anything outside of material nature?
It’s called a joke
Idiotic joke
It’s fucking mindless.
I bet you’re a blast at parties.
You’re fun!
Up to the introduction of quantum mechanics imaginary numbers where only ever a theoretical tool and any calculation in electromagnetism, mechanics or even relativity can be done without them.
Also, any measurement you can make will always result in real numbers because there is no logical interpretation for imaginary measurements (a speed of 2+i m/s doesnt really make sense)
Bro, are you not aware of the Fourier transform?!? Electrical impedance? Wtf???
I said that any calculation in electrodynamics CAN be done without imaginary numbers, I never said that it would be the most common or convenient way of doing things.
If you use a different form of solution to maxwells equations, electrical impedance can totally be expressed as just another real property. Fourier transform also is not necessary to solve maxwells equations or any other physical systems. It just might make it significantly easier and more convenient.
Obviously imaginary numbers existed and where used way before quantum mechanics was a thing but they werent technically necessary in physics because they never appeared in the equations of fundamental theories (Maxwells equations, general relativity, newtonian mechanics)
Yes, and one CAN integrate by taking paper cuttings and dispense entirely with the idea of infinity.
I was just trying to make an argument that imaginary numbers were technically not necessary and thus it makes historical sense that they werent seen as something ‘real’. Im not trying to get people to stop using them ;)
Eh, this is not worth your time or mine to argue about. Let’s move on. Also, I take your point.
Imaginary numbers are indeed poorly named. They are not much more imaginary than members of ℝ.
It’s all fine… except for the part where reality has a √-1 component.
Well, in AC circuits, having √3̅+√-̅1̅ A of current makes as much sense as having 2 amps with a 30° phase shift. It’s just easier notation for calculations - Cartesian coordinates for what would otherwise be polar.
That’s BS notation. If you want Cartesian, just use 3i+1j, no need for some impossible √-1 that you then redefine some operations for, just so it becomes orthogonal to R.
You might want to look up geometric algebra for a better geometric interpretation of complex numbers than the complex plane with a “real” and “imaginary” axis
The nice thing about 𝑖 = √-̅1̅ is that you don’t need to redefine any operations for it, ℐ𝓂 is “automatically” orthogonal to ℛℯ.
Yeah but quantum mechanics is just magic.
There’s a really good science fiction novel by Robert Sheckley called Immortality, Inc. where scientists in the future have discovered that there is an afterlife, but the only way to ensure you get there is a medical procedure and you can only do that if you can afford it. That’s just the beginning, there’s a huge amount of worldbuilding, but that’s the main theme of the book.
actual theoretical physicist here: “imaginary numbers” are just poorly named, there’s nothing imaginary about them. You might as well use 2D geometric algebra to do the exact same job (treating real numbers as scalars and imaginary numbers as pseudoscalars)
If you think it to the end, existence of an aftlerlife would be evidence that we run in a simulation.
Friend of mine (who is dead now ironically enough, and damn, I miss him), wrote a story about this. Where the dead show up on some random planet in the Andromeda Galaxy, in their prime, one that’s infinitely large and does the minecraft thing where it generates as you go, and contains the means to do pretty much anything except for leave… with them just showing up in the Capital City of the planet if they die again, which cannot be done of natural causes here.
The dead initially think it’s Heaven, but then they notice “Heaven” is being powered by a Dyson Sphere, eventually they connect enough of the dots to realize that their world is a simulation.
The protagonist is the grandchild of one of the deceased who wound up here after testing experimental teleportation technology, turns out the simulation brought him there to inform him why teleportation technology shouldn’t be invented.
Eventually the grandchild goes back to Earth, agreeing to keep this a secret, for fear that if people knew about this it would create “Dyson Sphere cults” and would encourage people to commit mass suicide, just “dying to get there”
My thought was more like, then there must be god, that god must have been created (since not naturally developed) so he must be there for a reason (administrator or something) so there must be a system behind it.
But nice story!
How did you come to that conclusion?
Which part?