Ask HN: Is the real world computational all the way down?

A Hacker News post asks whether the real world is "computational all the way down," citing Stephen Wolfram's claim that the universe is computational and Guillermo Rauch's tweet that "Everything is code." The author, who co-authored a paper on highly programmable 3D, argues that spatial intelligence in AI — including systems like Astra and Fable generating ThreeJS, Blender, or CAD objects — could eventually express everything as source code, with abilities encoded as attributes such as rig['Leg_*_Hip'].rotation = 42° or w.rotation.y = 0.42 rad. The post has 1 point and 0 comments.

Stephen Wolfram states the entire universe is computational all the way down. Guillermo Rauch recently tweeted: Everything is code. These may be soundbites. But I've been thinking about how the take-off of spatial intelligence within AI is setting the stage for actually expressing everything as source code. I recently co-authored a paper on highly programmable 3D. For that, I surveyed quite a bit of the field. Philosophically speaking, when I see the likes of Astra/Fable generating ThreeJS, Blender or CAD objects, I feel this expressiveness can conceivably one day eat everything. As they improve at synthesizing higher order differentials, their ability to produce unique shapes will improve too. And because code can express form and functionality both, expressing abilities is basically just encoding attributes in the software: - I.e. when a leg is moved, at its core, it's something like rig 'Leg Hip' .rotation = 42° - When a vehicle turns, we're essentially doing something like w.rotation.y = 0.42 rad - When a jello jiggles, it's something like Σ A·e^ −λr ·e^ −decay·τ · 1−b + b·cos ωτ − kr · p̂ Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49708962 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49708962 Points: 1 Comments: 0