At 3:30 in the above video ("Theoretical Physicist Finds Computer Code in String Theory"), James Gates says, "Computer code -- strings of bits of ones and zeroes. It's a special kind of computer code that was invented by a scientist named Claude Shannon in the 1940s."
The expressed idea of finding "computer code" is a very problematic exercise in communications (or information). When you know a hammer, many things tend to look like a nail. And when you know the electronic computers we have today, many things tend to look like a string of ones and zeroes. Strings of ones and zeros are not necessarily a code, and any code is not necessarily a useful set of instructions for a computer, and computers themselves can be very different to the point of being completely incompatible. While information can be encoded in binary (base 2), it can also be encoded in many other numbering systems, like decimal (base 10) and hexadecimal (base 16). You could even say that the information flow occurring right now between me and you is essentially a base 27 code utilizing the 26 letters of the alphabet and the blank space (ignoring numbers, punctuation, and capitalization for the moment, which can be represented as words or ignored). If our primitive understanding of genetics is somewhat correct, you could also say that all life on Earth comes from a base 4 encoding determined by the four DNA molecules adenine, guanine, cytosine, and thymine.
Declaring that there is "computer code" behind string theory is like saying there is information behind any theory. You are saying very little in a spectacular fashion. Having Neil deGrasse Tyson grandstanding on this one is appropriate since he is the designated high priest of public science, a gatekeeper to control the public mind, just as his predecessor Carl Sagan did. It's a form of controlled opposition as well as a limited hangout. The implication is that computer code requires a coder. This is the same flawed argument the creationists used by claiming DNA carries information and must therefore require a programmer, i.e. a god. A god, of course, gives legitimacy to the positions held by the priests, which is ultimately a self-serving agenda by the priests who claim to have made the "computer code" discovery.
It appears that
Claude Shannon helped move both binary code and Boolean logic into switched arrays (computers), which is the "special kind" of computer code James Gates is referring to in the quote above. Again this is saying very little in spectacular fashion, apparently in an attempt to add mystery and legitimacy to the discovery of the "computer code" behind the equations of string theory. If string theory is such a good model of reality, why must the priests perform all these disingenuous tricks to generate awe in the audience? In other words, the awe seems orchestrated to me, and not at all merited. That suggests a con-game is occurring.
As commenter "Walter White"
wrote, "Sounds like a bit of good ol bullshit to me."
At the other end of the comment spectrum is this:
Philip Gibbs calls it "pure speculation" instead of BS. So there are reasons to suggest that the "computer code" claim is incorrect. I certainly don't believe it.
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