Greg Egan’s Dust Theory

The first known publication of the idea of event symmetry is in a work of science fiction rather than a journal of science. Greg Egan used the idea in a short story called “Dust” in 1992 and expanded it into the novel Permutation City in 1995. Egan used dust theory as a way of exploring the question of whether a perfect computer simulation of a person differs from the real thing. However, his description of the dust theory as an extension of general relativity is also a consistent statement of the principle of event symmetry as used in quantum gravity.

— Wikipedia on Event symmetry

2010.02.03 Wednesday ACHK