• usualsuspect191@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    It’s possible to have an infinite number of universes where you win the lottery in none of them. It’s a common misconception that infinity=every combination when that’s not necessarily the case (there are infinite values between 1 and 2 for example, but none of those are 3)

  • nandeEbisu@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    That’s only if you assume that you winning the lottery falls within the infinite, but bounded, realm of random fluctuations between when you bought the ticket and the winning numbers are drawn. There’s still physical constraints that the random quantum fluctuations fall within.

    An example is, there are infinite numbers between 1 and 2, there’s 1.1, 1.11, 1.111, etc. Because of the constraints however, we can still know that none of those infinite numbers between 1 and 2 are equal to 3. Infinite doesn’t mean anything is possible.

  • Blóðbók@slrpnk.net
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    1 year ago

    While the basic idea is interesting, the statement is misconceived. It confuses what you believe to be possible with what is possible according to quantum physics.

    For your statement to be true, the lottery would have to be set up in such a way that the choice of winning lottery number is decided by the outcome of a quantum measurement which includes the possibility of your number being chosen. The outcome would then exist in superposition, and as soon as you learn the result, you are entangled with it and enter into superposition as well.

    But like I said, the core idea is still fun to think about, because this type of branching happens constantly and it becomes an interesting philosophical dilemma of how to think about what could possibly happen, not merely what does (as far as any ‘you’ can tell). Imagine if you could experience all outcomes of some particular chain of events and how that would affect the way you make decisions.