The frame rate of the universe (2009)

Pratchett would have then said, each of these frames is an entirely new universe, the previous one being destroyed.<p>&quot;And they are told: &#x27;Wen considered the nature of time and understood that the universe is, instant by instant, recreated anew. Therefore, he understood, there is in truth no past, only a memory of the past. Blink your eyes, and the world you see next did not exist when you closed them. Therefore, he said, the only appropriate state of the mind is surprise. The only appropriate state of the heart is joy. The sky you see now, you have never seen before. The perfect moment is now. Be glad of it.&#x27;&quot;<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.goodreads.com&#x2F;work&#x2F;quotes&#x2F;46982-thief-of-time" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.goodreads.com&#x2F;work&#x2F;quotes&#x2F;46982-thief-of-time</a>

I&#x27;ve often wondered if the speed of light was somehow related to the computation cycles per second of our universe.<p>For example, imagine if the universe was made of a three dimensional fabric of tiny pixels, and the only way information could move to another adjacent pixel was one universe calculation at a time.<p>So when something without mass is moving across a field of pixels, its speed is capped by the number of universe calculations happening per second.

My physics almost stopped at Newton but I liked the article because it resonates with some thoughts I had about Zeno&#x27;s arrow paradox - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Zeno%27s_paradoxes#Arrow_paradox" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Zeno%27s_paradoxes#Arrow_parad...</a><p>What if space is discrete and time is also discrete? Then there is no paradox. It disappears. I find the possibility that the Universe computes in `ticks` and space is discrete to be very soothing and I&#x27;m sure it has nothing to do with me liking computers :)

To me a neat consequence of quantized motion and dimensional extent is that there&#x27;s a hard limit on angular orientation and hence accuracy. That is to say, it&#x27;s possible to be far enough away and in a proper position such that a particle in another certain position could not be propelled directly at you, only at positions around you since you could be standing in the middle of the maximum angular resolution of the propelling force.

There is no evidence the Planck length is the smallest possible length in the universe, a pop sci misconception. It is the length at which quantum effects dominate the structure of space time, ie &quot;quantum foam&quot;. It is perhaps the smallest measurable distance according to some calculations. Most experimental evidence indicates space is continuous.

He did the monster math and calculated that the frame rate of the universe is 18 septillion FPS.<p>Let&#x27;s assume we are already in a game running with this FPS. Could we somehow prove that it&#x27;s actually a simulation or disprove in the case it&#x27;s not?

&gt; If we want to fit the universe into a box, its sides would have to be twice that size. That is 5.4 × 10^61 Planck lengths.<p>206 bits is enough to address the precise position of anything in the universe.

This somehow reminds me of [That Alien Message][0] from Less Wrong. Worth a read!<p>[0]:<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.lesswrong.com&#x2F;posts&#x2F;5wMcKNAwB6X4mp9og&#x2F;that-alien-message" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.lesswrong.com&#x2F;posts&#x2F;5wMcKNAwB6X4mp9og&#x2F;that-alien...</a>

For those interested, the &quot;3D projection of a 2D surface&quot; that the author mentions is more formally called AdS-CFT Correspondence[0]. The AdS stands for &quot;Anti-de Sitter spaces&quot; and CFT for &quot;Conformal Field Theories&quot;. This finds that the &quot;surface&quot; of the former looks like an example of the latter.<p>Man, the author has stumbled onto such a cool bit of physics&#x2F;math. Wish I could ramble on about it more, but I&#x27;m about to head to work. Hopefully, someone else can elaborate!<p>[0]:<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;AdS&#x2F;CFT_correspondence" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;AdS&#x2F;CFT_correspondence</a>

Kind of on the same vibe, you can think of the speed of light as the bandwidth of spacetime.

&gt; It&#x27;s still fascinating to think of the universe as a computer simulation. Modern physics make it seem more like a video game than ever.<p>The double slit experiment is all I needed to see to become fairly convinced that the universe is a simulation. I view it as a race condition in our physics.