How's Arcanorium going, anyone?

[Telarus, KSC]

Hope you people still sail through this port sometimes. The Pacific NW continues to be wet and wet and wet. Minor earthquake-age here in Oregon, pretty decent one back in Hawaii.

Oh, Pete, if you randomly spy this, I wanted to throw this article in your direction. May spark something, or you may be aware of it thro a different source:
Jaron's World: Raft to the Future
Does time come together like an island of boats floating on the open seas?
By Jaron Lanier
DISCOVER Vol. 27 No. 10 | October 2006 | Technology

This was prefixed  with an overview of some of the theories of "20th-century mathematicians, includingKurt Gödel, Alan Turing, and Gregory Chaitin, who proved that the more math you learn, the more bizarre it gets."

What ultimately matters is whether a mathematical theory is useful. To the limit of our ability to perform experiments, it appears that math and reality correlate perfectly. When a mathematical object describes something in nature well, the math can be counted on to predict other things about nature. For instance, the possibility of negative signs in a mathematical model created by physicist Paul Dirac predicted the existence of antimatter—and the astonishing stuff turned out truly to exist.

So how do physics and math fit together at the deepest level of reality? Suppose mathematical truth had the crystalline, predictable quality that was once expected of it. If time were to emerge from the relationships among the elements of this impossible kind of math, there would be a problem. All the moments emerging from such a regular structure would be essentially the same. How, then, could there be an arrow of time if each moment was no more different from another moment than one photon is from another photon?

Ah, but we now have a different picture of what math is like. Math is the messiest thing there is. So a pattern emerging from connections among mathematical objects can reflect the spreading and deepening weirdness inherent in the exploration of math outward from any starting point. Furthermore, because of the incompleteness inherent in the global structure of math, there is no way to correlate physics with math except by picking a particular starting point. The continent emerging from the rafts would take on bizarre and unpredictable geometric structures as it grew, creating landmarks rooted in math's never-ending strangeness.

The universe—or God, if you like—can be thought of as a mathematician revealing ever more of the fundamentally unpredictable structure of math, thereby giving rise to cosmically surprising patterns of rafts, or frameworks for geometric reality. This process could be what allows time to emerge.

It is such an odd concept that I'll try saying it a slightly different way. Suppose the universe correlates with some patch of math. That patch cannot be complete and will inevitably bleed into additional math that is even stranger than the starting patch. If a correlation existed before, it ought to continue with new weird stuff. So, inherent in any reality correlated to math, there is an unstoppable passage into ever-increasing levels of weirdness. That suggests reality can be dynamic even without a dimension of time, which means there's something dynamic within which time can emerge.

These are hard ideas, and we struggle with them, but this line of thinking is at least a start at imagining one way that time itself could have an environment within which to evolve.

[insideout]

I was also wondering if anyone was having any fun / luck with mr. carrolls new endevour? 

                                 -inside.out-

[jamadara]

The Pacific NW continues to be wet and wet and wet.

Yeah, I realize I live in Seattle and all, but this is getting to be a bit much.

Arcanorium is doing great as far as I can tell. We should be publishing the first issue of the journal, soon. We will drop a line here when that happens so everyone who wants to can get a copy.

Pax,
Joshua

[D.G.]

Nice link, Telarus.  Chaitin wrote a lucid and accessible-to-nonmathematicians book called MetaMath about issues of complexity and randomness, Smolin wrote another good one about physics called Three Roads to Quantum Gravity. 

The Gödel stuff, however, can't really be read without a fairly extreme technical background in logic.

The value of a result requiring extreme studies may be questionable but I think important results like Girdle's bleed into public consciousness (of the sensitive) of their own accord once uncovered (or before or during uncovering). 

If the physics of time lies anywhere, the limits of mathematical knowability provide a great place to look for it.

29!

[Isis]

We lived through the first 6 weeks didn't we? 
Yeap and it is going to be a great newsjournal, so don't miss that one.

Quality of members is high and those who dare to post yet, are really enthusiastic. We are now at 60 members
and I personally know a few, who don't even dare to post yet, but aren't less enthusiastic.
Pretty sure , there are those that will think otherwise. But not around me.
And if, I would slap them silly.
 
What I specially like is the high number of women participating.
For some reason or another it has not yet become another male enclave as one often finds in magic.
Will probably mean nothing to you males. So read over this.
What about activity with only 60 members, the present teachers included,  comparing the numbers of post here and over there:
We came in six weeks to half of the activity there, then we have gotten here in years.
So the ship keeps floating and exchange is happening.

It is a great thing if one gets reaffirmed in magical thinking day by day.
A bit like going to a temple.
It has the effect on me, that I am practically don't do anything anymore, without thinking magic.
Never thought that would be possible, but it is.
I came to realize that without that, one misses half of the time the results of magic.
Wow, the thing appears even greater, then I thought it was. 
 
Pete on his own turf is a lot more outspoken, then he was in MLA and gives as chancellor
food for thought also outside his courses.
He is a great coach, with a practical approach to life and magic.
I still find that the greatest gift of Arcanorium is to actually communicate with the man others only write about,
being so sure, that he was a man from the past.
Well his new book is still to come.
Can happen that a few after writers have to update their versions as well.   

I am still amazed that people do think twice to sign up.
The early day, when things are not yet in a certain form,
those are the times, you can have all the fun, build your connections.

Also as one coach once said to me:
If you come with curiosity, curiosity is all you will get out of it.
It was the only sentence I ever used from this seminar.
I was to blown away with this one.
Paid 450 $ dollar for it.
Has changed my life for ever, worth every dollar.

For those, who are seriously thinking about to become a member, not a consumer ( note the difference)  a tip:
Members of Arcanorium can now introduce others,
to have a free week membership to get a feel of the community.




 
 

 
 

[Annihilation]

It is a great thing if one gets reaffirmed in magical thinking day by day.
A bit like going to a temple.

So a large part of the benefit you feel is the opportunity to gain an affirmation in magical thinking that you prefer not to provide yourself?

I still find that the greatest gift of Arcanorium is to actually communicate with the man others only write about,

Would you prefer to be the one others only write about? If so how does, and if not how could, Arcanorium help with that?

How many members, roughly, are not UK-based?

[Isis]

So a large part of the benefit you feel is the opportunity to gain an affirmation in magical thinking that you prefer not to provide yourself?

Correction: 
One of the benefits  and reaffirmation, which implies that it already has been done once at least.  
I am talking about the concept of an egregore really.
 

Would you prefer to be the one others only write about? If so how does, and if not how could, Arcanorium help with that?

Let me put it that way.
If you do what you like, you cannot always avoid that others write about you. 
Sometimes in order to do what you like you need others to write about you.
I don't belong to the second category.

How many members, roughly, are not UK-based?

I think the majority. But we have seven countries so far, if I am not mistaken,
so that shouldn't come as surprise.
 
Why is that of interest to you?
 

[Annihilation]

Because the thing does come across as a British thing. British chaos magic, to this person, has a flavor distinct enough from French or American or German or Russian chaos magic, and distinct enough from mixes, to make its presence a significant factor in evaluation of Arcanorium and its worthiness of money.

Thank you for your help.

[Isis]

Annihilation, I can see your point.

Anyhow here a link to Abracademia the first Newsjournal of Arcanorium:

http://www.witteruijter.com/arcanorium/abracademia1.pdf

5 national flavors in this one, free to share.

[stokastikos]

Re first post on this thread,Telarus, I just spotted it, my apologies for not dropping in on this tavern for some time, but things have been very busy over on Arcanorium.

Most of the mathematics that humans have discovered so far does not have a use. Some of the apparently useless stuff discovered in the past has subsequently found a use, for example number theory seemed like a rather abstract enterprise for a long while, but it has recently found to be just the ticket for cryptography, and imaginary numbers which once seemed a mere curiosity now find uses in electrical engineering and quantum physics. Thus mathematicians keep exploring strange and apparently useless maths partly out of curiosity and partly because they may one day find a use.

However something else has happened with Superstring and Brane theory and Loop Quantum Gravity, mathematical physicists attempted to make a model to incorporate both quantum physics and general relativity, these were attempts at applied rather than pure maths. Disastrously some might say, Superstring theory ended up as a huge mathematical edifice and only a few small bits of it seem to correspond to this universe, and there is no rigorous way to show us which bit to use. Quite a few theorists are now saying that the theory is just a huge chunk of abstract maths that probably has nothing to do with physics at all A similar situation pertains in the other two lines of theory, they could all be pi in the sky.

Einstein himself commented upon the unreasonable effectiveness of maths, and Penrose has commented that the fact that certain physical constants always have the same mathematical value to a fantastic degree of precision. However that does not prove that the universe is made of mathematics, or that if you stripped away the entire universe the underlying maths would still be there. It all remains a puzzle. However the hypothesis that the seemingly unlimited ammount of maths remaining to be discovered somehow creates the phenomena of time does seem rather questionable, its probably true only for mathematicians so dedicated to their art that it creates time for them. It may have no more objective meaning than the hypothesis that the vastness of god creates time.

Anyway, Arcanorium is on fire with lively exchanges, sparkling wit, brilliant ideas, and three courses in progress simultaneously during each semester, I'd better get back over there, duty calls.
Regards, Pete.   

[stokastikos]

Seasonal Greetings from Arcanorium College, we are about to break for the xmas holidays although the Common Room and Bar Remain open, and archives from the first 6 courses of our first two semesters are available as a library resource.
As one third of our academic year has passed now, the membership fee for the rest of the year till next September has accordingly been adjusted to U$ 100. You can register at any time from now on for the spring and summer terms.

The spring term will feature in Semester 3 Writing Magical Fiction  (Jaq d Hawkins), Overview of the GD System (Dalryada) & NLP for Magicians  (Dave Lee)
Semester 4 Runes and the Sorcerer (Ian Read), Divination 101 (Lola Babalon) & Psychic Communication  (Isis)
The summer term will feature a further 6 courses from Peter J Carroll, Lionel Snell (Ramsay Dukes), and others. 
Register Now for $100 for unlimited access till September 2007

Its Going Great! All the best for the festive season, Pete Carroll.

[stokastikos]

Arcanorium College now has 2250 posts in 304 topics (and no spam!). And all this just since late September. The Common Room and Bar are very busy and 3 new courses have just begun. Registration for the remaining 12 courses of this year and all facilities is a mere U$100 inclusive.

Its pretty lively and intense, and many of the cream of the world's wizardry are there, participating in the theory and practise of Magic.

Stokastikos (Peter J Carroll)

[stokastikos]

This poor old Ideosphere seems to be sinking under the weight of editorial neglect and spam, so I'm saying goodbye, deleting it from my favourites, and putting my efforts into Arcanorium College.

Adios amigos. Pete Carroll.