The Wolfram Physics Project
After a few iterations, I think I understand the point of this piece. It was a bit difficult to hone in on, though.<p>The article suggests that working out the theory of something like rule production systems, and then figuring out how that theory relates to existing insights from physics, is the best path toward a Fundamental Theory of Physics.<p>My primary source of skepticism stems from the fact that the theory of rule production systems is not exactly a new area of study. It&#x27;s been well-developed at various points in time and from various perspectives by the theoretical CS, programming language theory, automated theorem proving, and mathematical logic communities. That theory addresses most of Stephen&#x27;s &quot;big difficult questions&quot; about the non-physics side of things. For example, his &quot;emulation cones&quot; are a new name for a <i>very</i> old and <i>extremely</i> well-studied idea. The term &quot;rulial space&quot;, similarly, is a new name for an idea that&#x27;s well-developed in programming language theory.<p>I sympathize with Stephen. In fact, he sounds a bit like I did early in my scientific career. Unfortunately, though, I just don&#x27;t see how these old well-understood ideas from computer science are going to result in a new fundamental theory of physics.