In Episode 15: Where to apply Wolfram’s rules? (listen to the audio ⋅ watch the video) I introduced a radical idea.

When we’re applying a rule to a graph in Wolfram Physics, there are generally many possible places in the graph we could apply the rule, giving us many possible next states of the universe.

Here’s the radical idea: rather than choose one of these possible universes, we choose not to choose. Instead, we keep each of them in mind.

The trouble is, if we choose not to choose, the number of possible universes we have to keep in mind gets extremely large extremely quickly.

To help us visualize all these possible universes, we’re going to need the multiway graph.

It’s a crucial idea in Wolfram Physics.

The multiway graph will allow us to derive aspects of quantum mechanics from Wolfram Physics.

It’ll lead us to a concept of the observer that promises to resolve issues related to the collapse of the wavefunction that have plagued quantum mechanics ever since Schrödinger put his metaphorical cat into a metaphorical cage.

And maybe, just maybe, it’ll lead us to a model of consciousness itself.

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The Last Theory is hosted by Mark Jeffery, founder of Open Web Mind