[sdiy] Is everything digital?

[Bob Weigel]

xmurz at gmx.de wrote:

>I have both articles here (scanned in and as a copy).
>
>As some have pointed out, "analogue" and "digital" are only "models" 
>
Let me simplify/intensify the accuracy of that.  Digital is a special 
framework of analog in electronics in which the engineering is PURELY 
interested in the proper recognition of 1's and 0's on a particular line 
within a particular frame of time.   Schmidt Trigger chips are for 
instance a hybrid chip which internally employs analog technology (which 
is concerned with MORE than the recognition of 1's and 0's) AS PART of 
its designated function...which is to make iffy signals more 'digital' :-).
     Analog meanwhile isn't a 'model'.  It simply is the exploitation of 
physical principles to design a functional device in electronics.  We 
made the distinction to digital because it comprised a whole new design 
philosophy towards accomplishing various ends....but using analog all 
the way.  It's just a subset of analog in other words.

>which
>are simplifications which are true only to a certain extend (a certain "space").
>Nothing truely "is"  analogue or "digital". 
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I absolutely don't see why.  Perhaps you mean what we perceive as analog 
goes a lot deeper than what we perceive?  Meanwhile...if it works..what 
we perceive as digital is exactly digital. Hehe.

>We use models such as quantum theory to describe what we otherwise don't 
>know how to talk about in a scientific manner.
>
>But all models we have are only models. Even mathematics.
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Actually..mathmatics is simply applied truth until..you get into 
theoretical math I guess :-).  But math is founded on definitions that 
are not negotiable or theoretical.  We properly label an object like an 
apple.  It is understood by the observer that this is not necessarily 
THE perfect apple...but rather that it has been labelled as such for the 
performance of some logical math that can be applied to a 
logical/truthful end.  1 apple plus 2 apples gives three apples.  
Nothing whatsoever is implied about the condition or origin of the 
apples and therefore the math done is quite non-negotiable.  You indeed 
can reliably count three things resembling apples there.  It has nothing 
to do with 'modelling'.

>We can prove things but we use models again. 
>The only real judge is nature. But even nature can be inconsistent.
>
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It...can?  YOu mean like the time I was in a full on sprint form my 
basketball practise session late at night, to find that my uncle had 
stuck a bike rack he was fixing by my car in the shadows.  I immediately 
stuck out my hands to prepare to break the fall.  I...stiff armed the 
steel rebard loop at the top of the bike rack.  Ouch.  Now thoughts like 
"I have completely destroyed my hand..and why did that (now late 
uncle..no I didn't kill him :-) ) guy stick this here!"  went through my 
head but praying and walking up to the house I realized that it was 
completely fine!  No pain...no bruise...nothing!
      I've had my share of interacting with nature.  That is what we 
call a full scale miracle.  I defy anyone to run well over 15mph and 
repeat that experiment.  You will break something exactly 1,000,000 out 
of 1,000,000 times I am quite certain.   You simply cannot stiff arm a 
relatively sharp point of steel like that braced against SOLID EARTH 
without some kind of interaction taking place that results in hospital 
normally.  In that way..'nature is inconsistent' indeed :-).  But in 
cases where something that defies physical laws doesn't happen...there 
is a consistency at the micromicro level.  THis is simply a way of 
saying NOTHING happens for NOTHING :-). 
       Take radiation.  We look at the phenomena and call it "random" in 
terms of when an emission is going to occur.  We will wind up with a 
somewhat consistent rate overall, but we have no idea when the next one 
pops off.  This isn't because it's just happening truly randomly. 
Rather, we just don't have the facilities to monitor the mechanisms that 
decide when an electron becomes a beta particle for instance.   
Remember, that electron was in a harmonic relationship 'spinning' in 
some kind of 'orbit' as we model it...and that indeed is a model.  In 
reality there is a harmonic EM interaction going on that happened to 
share the same mathmatical relationships as an orbit so as to cause Bohr 
to speculate that such was the case.  So that radiation occurs either 
because some kind of disturbance to the harmonic aspect of that 
relationship ocurred (say a near 'collision' with another atom where the 
wave functions of outer orbital electrons created a disturbance 
sufficient to kick one or both of them out of the lattice or atom or 
whatever they were associated with at the time.

>When I got to know quantum computing / quantum theory, I thought
>now we finally get a system where we can't say "digital" or "analogue" anymore,
>we can end that digital vs analogue war :)
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Hehe...my ears will have to become POW's first.  -Bob

>- Hans
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