Abstract
In the “Trialogue on the number of fundamental physical constants” was debated the number, from 1 to 3, of fundamental dimensionful units required, noting that “It is necessary and sufficient to have three basic units in order to reproduce in an experimentally meaningful way the dimensions of all physical quantities”. This implies that units such as mass, space, time, charge… ‘are’ in some physical sense, the Trialogue debating which, if any, are ‘the fundamental units’ from which the other units may then be derived. In a general mathematical universe hypothesis these units do not exist in any material sense, nevertheless there is no compelling reason why the mathematics for time-ness should relate to or depend upon the mathematics for mass-ness or space-ness, thus even a mathematical universe may be said to have a ‘form’ or ‘structure’ which can be referred to. The virtual universe which I shall discuss here is a special case of the mathematical universe in which these units must sum to unity, units = 1, the analogy being a computer game. I will argue that a virtual Descartes has no fundamental reference to which he may point and then state; ergo sum (therefore I am).
Malcolm Macleod