> > It is impossible to have a perfect model of any physical system
>> that takes less space and matter than the system itself.
>
>Not a perfect material model of a material system.
>
>> Any description of a physical system that gets down to the atomic
>> level would require more atoms to record it than there are atoms
>> in the system.
>
>I proposed a similar argument a few weeks ago on this forum.
>One difference: I can imagine a perfect model of a system, using just
>exactly the same amount of matter and space as that system occupies.
>That we can't make such models is another issue. (01)
A perfect predictive model of a probabilistic data generating process
is possible, if we understand perfect in the sense of accurately
forecasting probabilities in cases where forecasting actual values is
unachievable. It is possible that such a model is much smaller than
the actual system. We have such a system, to accuracy 10^-12 or so,
for well-controlled microscopic physical systems. It's called
quantum theory. (02)
K (03)
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