ICLR 2025
Shaden Alshammari, John Hershey, Axel Feldmann, William T. Freeman, Mark Hamilton.
MIT, Microsoft, Google.
[ https://openreview.net/forum?id=WfaQrKCr4X](https://openreview.net/forum?id=WfaQrKCr4X
[ https://github.com/mhamilton723/STEGO](https://github.com/mhamilton723/STEGO
The juridical metaphor in physics has ancient roots. Anaximander, in the 6th century BCE, was perhaps the first to invoke the concept of cosmic justice, speaking of natural entities paying “penalty and retribution to each other for their injustice according to the assessment of Time” (Kirk et al., 2010, p. 118). This anthropomorphizing tendency persisted through history, finding its formal expression in Newton’s Principia Mathematica, where he articulated his famous “laws” of motion. Newton, deeply influenced by his theological views, conceived of these laws as divine edicts — mathematical expressions of God’s will imposed upon a compliant universe (Cohen & Smith, 2002, p. 47).
This legal metaphor has served science admirably for centuries, providing a framework for conceptualizing the universe’s apparent obedience to mathematical principles. Yet it carries implicit assumptions worth examining. Laws suggest a lawgiver, hinting at external agency. They imply prescription rather than description — a subtle distinction with profound philosophical implications. As physicist Paul Davies (2010) observes, “The very notion of physical law is a theological one in the first place, a fact that makes many scientists squirm” (p. 74).
Enter the computational metaphor — a framework more resonant with our digital age. The universe, in this conceptualization, executes algorithms rather than obeying laws. Space, time, energy, and matter constitute the data structure upon which these algorithms operate. This shift is more than semantic; it reflects a fundamental reconceptualization of physical reality that aligns remarkably well with emerging theories in theoretical physics and information science.
By breaking a decades-old paradigm and rethinking the role that the dimension of time plays in physics, researchers from the University of Rostock and the University of Birmingham have discovered novel flashes of light that come from and go into nothingness—like magic at first glance but with deep mathematical roots that protect against all kinds of outside perturbations. Their findings have now been published in the journal Nature Photonics.
Time is the strange dimension: Unlike its spatial siblings, it is a one-way street as the clock only ever ticks forward and never backward. Scientists have long been aware of time’s quirks, with the British astrophysicist Sir Arthur Eddington musing about this “arrow of time” in his 1927 lectures. Nevertheless, whether it be because of or despite its uniqueness, time as a dimension for physics to play out in has long received far less attention than space.
Recently though, rapid progress in the research on so-called spatiotemporal crystals, objects with repeating patterns in time and space, has inspired a rethinking of the role time should play in our understanding of physics. Additionally, this has spawned the question of whether the uniqueness of time can be more than a mere quirk and instead lead to new effects ultimately useful in applications.
“Metaphysical Experiments: Physics and the Invention of the Universe” by Bjørn Ekeberg Book Link: https://amzn.to/4imNNk5
“Metaphysical Experiments, Physics and the Invention of the Universe,” explores the intricate relationship between physics and metaphysics, arguing that fundamental metaphysical assumptions profoundly shape scientific inquiry, particularly in cosmology. The author examines historical developments from Galileo and Newton to modern cosmology and particle physics, highlighting how theoretical frameworks and experimental practices are intertwined with philosophical commitments about the nature of reality. The text critiques the uncritical acceptance of mathematical universality in contemporary physics, suggesting that cosmology’s reliance on hypological and metalogical reasoning reveals a deep-seated faith rather than pure empirical validation. Ultimately, the book questions the limits and implications of a science that strives for universal mathematical truth while potentially overlooking its own inherent complexities and metaphysical underpinnings. Chapter summaries:
- Cosmology in the Cave: This chapter examines the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Geneva to explore the metaphysics involved in the pursuit of a “Theory of Everything” linking subatomic physics to cosmology.
- Of God and Nature: This chapter delves into the seventeenth century to analyze the invention of the universe as a concept alongside the first telescope, considering the roles of Galileo, Descartes, and Spinoza.
- Probability and Proliferation: This chapter investigates the nineteenth-century shift in physics with the rise of probabilistic reasoning and the scientific invention of the particle, focusing on figures like Maxwell and Planck.
- Metaphysics with a Big Bang: This chapter discusses the twentieth-century emergence of scientific cosmology and the big bang theory, shaped by large-scale science projects and the ideas of Einstein and Hawking.
- Conclusion: This final section questions the significance of large-scale experiments like the JWST as metaphysical explorations and reflects on our contemporary scientific relationship with the cosmos.
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#JWST
#LHC
#BigBangTheory.
#DarkMatter.
#DarkEnergy.
#SpaceTelescope.
#ParticlePhysics.
#HistoryofPhysics.
#ScientificInquiry #scienceandreligion #meaningoflife #consciousness #universe #god #spirituality #faith #reason #creationtheory #finetuninguniverse #astrophysics #quantumphysics #intelligentdesign #cosmicconsciousness #reality #Consciousness #QuantumPhysics #Universe #Nonlocality #QuantumEntanglement #CosmicInformation #ScienceOfMind #NatureOfReality #Spirit #BigLibraryHypothesis #NLSETI #QuantumBrain #Multiverse #InformationTheory #ExtrasensoryPerception #SciencePhilosophy #deepdive #skeptic #podcast #synopsis #books #bookreview #ai #artificialintelligence #booktube #aigenerated #history #alternativehistory #aideepdive #ancientmysteries #hiddenhistory #futurism #videoessay
When an electric current passes through some materials, it generates a voltage perpendicular to the direction in which the current is flowing and of an applied magnetic field. This physical phenomenon, known as the anomalous Hall effect, has been linked to the intrinsic properties of some materials.
The efficiency with which a longitudinal current drives a transverse spin-polarized current in these materials is referred to as the anomalous Hall angle (θA). In many conventional magnetic materials, this angle is typically very small, which in turn limits the sensitivity of sensors and other devices developed using these materials.
Researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences have introduced a new mathematical model that allows them to modulate the θA in the magnetic topological semimetal Co3Sn2S2.
There are a seemingly endless number of quantum states that describe quantum matter and the strange phenomena that emerge when large numbers of electrons interact. For decades, many of these states have been theoretical: mathematical and computational predictions potentially hiding among real-life materials—a zoo, as many scientists are coming to refer to it, with new “species” just waiting to be discovered and described.
In a new study published on April 3 in Nature, researchers added over a dozen states to the growing quantum zoo.
“Some of these states have never been seen before,” said lead author Xiaoyang Zhu, Howard Family Professor of Nanoscience at Columbia. “And we didn’t expect to see so many either.”
Existing numerical computing libraries lack native support for physical units, limiting their application in rigorous scientific computing. Here, the authors developed SAIUnit, which integrates physical units, and unit-aware mathematical functions and transformations into numerical computing libraries for artificial intelligence-driven scientific computing.
Gödel’s incompleteness theorem is used by both advocates and adversaries of strong AI to show that computers can(not) perform the same feats as humans. This article extends the construction through which Gödel proved his theorem, in order to allow a broader interpretation, showing that neither side has exploited its arguments to the fullest extend, and that the evidence can never be conclusive.
Dr.ir. C.J.B. Jongeneel & prof.dr. H. Koppelaar, Delft University of Technology, Faculty of Technical Mathematics and Informatics, Section of Knowledge Based Systems.
1 Introduction
A research team from the Institute of Statistical Mathematics and Panasonic Holdings Corporation has developed a machine learning algorithm, ShotgunCSP, that enables fast and accurate prediction of crystal structures from material compositions. The algorithm achieved world-leading performance in crystal structure prediction benchmarks.
Crystal structure prediction seeks to identify the stable or metastable crystal structures for any given chemical compound adopted under specific conditions. Traditionally, this process relies on iterative energy evaluations using time-consuming first-principles calculations and solving energy minimization problems to find stable atomic configurations. This challenge has been a cornerstone of materials science since the early 20th century.
Recently, advancements in computational technology and generative AI have enabled new approaches in this field. However, for large-scale or complex molecular systems, the exhaustive exploration of vast phase spaces demands enormous computational resources, making it an unresolved issue in materials science.
Scientists apply principles of math and physics to unravel the mystery of how the endoplasmic reticulum, an organelle vital to cellular life, constantly reshapes and reorganizes itself. As a second-year Ph.D. student and physicist, Zuben Scott hadn’t thought much about the endoplasmic reticulum s
