Subject: Wolfram's A New Kind of Science

From: Muli Ben-Yehuda <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 19 May 2002 10:05:46 +0300

/. story: 
http://science.slashdot.org/science/02/05/18/2242232.shtml?tid=134

book: 
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1579550088/

wired article (by Steven Levy, author of "Hackers"):
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/10.06/wolfram.html 

The article looks interesting (everything Levy writes is at the very
least interesting), the book looks either earth shattering or
completely bogus. It's only been out for a few days, but has 
anyone read it/is planning on reading it? I'm considering ordering it.
-- 
Mersday 27 Thrimidge 7466

http://vipe.technion.ac.il/~mulix/
http://syscalltrack.sf.net/

----- End forwarded message -----

-- 
Mersday 27 Thrimidge 7466

http://vipe.technion.ac.il/~mulix/
http://syscalltrack.sf.net/

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From: Oleg Goldshmidt <[email-masked]>
Date: 19 May 2002 11:12:51 +0300

> anyone read it/is planning on reading it? I'm considering ordering it.

Muli, you jumped the gun: I was reading Levy's article (very well
written, indeed) and thinking, this is worth sending to hackers-il...

I am also considering ordering the book. I consider Wolfram, whatever
his personal traits may be, one of those people whose mistakes are
interesting. I strongly suspect he is not totally mad, Wolfram
Research being what it is - I think that Levy's account of the
atmosphere there confirms that. And I think that the book may turn out
something in between "Earth shattering" and "completely bogus". It is
sure to be controversial - never deterred me in the past...

-- 
Oleg Goldshmidt | [email-masked] 
"We work by wit, and not by witchcraft,
 And wit depends on dilatory time..."

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From: Muli Ben-Yehuda <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 19 May 2002 13:01:26 +0300

> written, indeed) and thinking, this is worth sending to

Anyone have any of his other books, btw? I have Hackers, and have read
the Macintosh book ('Insanely Great'). If anyone has Crypto, Artifical
Life or Unicorn's Secret, and wouldn't mind selling/loaning it, I
would be delighted.

> sure to be controversial - never deterred me in the past...

My Amazon wish list is growing at an alarming pace :)
-- 
Mersday 27 Thrimidge 7466

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From: "Nadav Har'El" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 19 May 2002 13:18:32 +0300

> anyone read it/is planning on reading it? I'm considering ordering it.

This book has been on my Amazon.com wishlist since November 2001, when I
first heard about Wolfram was going to publish it (it was only published
this month). I am likely to order it later this month.

It seems potentially very interesting; I've always been interested how
order and complex things (such as life on earth) can appear from simple
mathematical, physical and philosophical rules, rather than needing to
assume an even more complex being ("god") bothered itself to design billions
of small details in our world.

Evolution is one way to explain the order and beings on our planet, and I've
read many books about that. But the theory of evolution and natural selection
also builds on the rules of physics and philosophy (metaphysics: ontology,
epistemology). But where do these rules come from? Did some God make them
or can we explain them by either simpler rules? Why do we have so many kinds
of elementary particles (quarks, leptons, etc.) and forces? Could there be a
universe with different laws still having someone like "us", intelligent
beings asking questions about their own universe?

I was hoping that Wolfram's book could answer some of these questions. Now
that the book is out I can finally find reviews about what this book really
is about, before I buy it "blindly".

Levy's article is making fun of the book's huge size: he says it "... dwarfed
a phone book" and that "At 1,280 pages, the book pushes the limit of what can
be physically bound between two covers", "It will cost $12 a copy to print -
five or six times that of a conventional book" and even that "people will take
decades to absorb everything Wolfram is proposing". Scary, considering all the
books I already have but never had time to read :( Levy also teases Wolfram,
calling him a "Bob Dylan of Physics" and a "middle-aged ... Jedi mind-warrior"
:) Much like the book it reviews, Levy's review is much too long...

P.S.

Daniel Denett's "Darwin's Dangerous Idea" also has a very interesting
chapter on cellular automata and Conway's "Game of Life".

There's a VERY unusual and unorthodox book about the philosophy of physics
and ontology in the "Universita Meshuderet" series called "Machsavot Al
Hametsiut" (if I remember correctly). After surveying the current knowledge
of physics, it tries to "prove" what the really elemenatary components of our
universe must be (of which quarks, leptons, force-carrying particles like
photons, gluons and the rest are just various combinations and manifestations)
based on only philosophical and mathematical reasoning. His theory is far-
fetched, and very unorthodox. It is a weird book indeed, and it's very hard
to grasp its ending (I don't think I even believe it yet).

> Mersday 27 Thrimidge 7466

What does that mean?? :)

-- 
Nadav Har'El                        |        Sunday, May 19 2002, 8 Sivan 5762
[email-masked]             |-----------------------------------------
Phone: +972-53-245868, ICQ 13349191 |"Outlook not so good." Wow! That magic 8-
http://nadav.harel.org.il           |ball knows everything! So, what about IE?

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From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 19 May 2002 16:29:27 +0300 (IDT)

> of small details in our world.

Well, the Mandelbrot Set seems very complex to us, and it is generated
from a very simple algorithm. It has O(1) information. For that matter, pi
or e or the square root of two, have O(1) information and it is conjured
(or proven) that their representation contains every possible sequence
that can be generated.

I guess some purely mathematical processes will generate a very complex
behaviour. If it weren't so, then it is possible that existence could not
have existed in the first place.

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Shlomi Fish        [email-masked]
Home Page:         http://t2.technion.ac.il/~shlomif/
Home E-mail:       [email-masked]

"Let's suppose you have a table with 2^n cups..."
"Wait a second - is n a natural number?"

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From: Tzafrir Cohen <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 19 May 2002 19:49:51 +0300 (IDT)

> > of small details in our world.

As for myself I have found the need of such assumption unnecessary. A
couple of Milyards of years are enough.

> (or proven) that their representation contains every possible sequence

The O) notation is not relevant here. It is relevant when you can talk of
a parametrized resource (e.g: exeution time as a function of the input
size). pi is a constant.

Note that using rational numbers we can only get an approximated value of
irrational values, such as pi, e and sqrt(2). This can create some
oddities as mentioned above.

-- 
Tzafrir Cohen
mailto:[email-masked]
http://www.technion.ac.il/~tzafrir