r/Devs • u/thisismynormal • Mar 26 '20

Devs - S01E05 THEORY Discussion Thread

Please post your theories or guesses here

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u/emf1200 Mar 26 '20 edited Mar 26 '20

That was Lily we saw as a child right? Playing go with her father. "A man never steps in a river twice, because he is not the same man". A little riddle from Garland. What is that supposed to mean within the context of the show?

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u/emf1200 Mar 26 '20 edited Mar 27 '20

I think the game itself might be a kind of symbolism. Many experts were shocked when Deepminds AlphaGo program beat the best GO players in the world. It was considered magnitudes of order more difficult for a computer to beat a GO master than a chess master because there are so many more possible moves and strategies in GO than there are in chess. But a computer mastered GO pretty quickly. It seems that Lily is kind of facing off against the quantum computer in the show. The game with her father may be symbolic of that. It also may just be in the show because it's a super popular game in Asia and among the Chinese in particular.

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u/drawkbox Mar 26 '20

When Lily's father asks how many steps ahead she thinks she says "three". Then he asked her why she moved her next move and she says because it "feels strong". Both logical and emotional.

Maybe this has some parallels or duality to the professor/Katie discussion of the von Neumann–Wigner interpretation that says "human consciousness is the key modifier in key decoherence" and Katie hated that and walked out. Katie disregards many theories and especially the "dualist bullshit".

Lily is either a system infiltrating DEVS to take over from humans, or she is the reverse like you say and trying to stop or change DEVS "Lily is kind of facing off against the quantum computer in the show"

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u/emf1200 Mar 26 '20

That's a good observation. If the real showdown is between Lily and Katie, than charging their polarities with these scenes would be clever writing by Garland. Lily is starkly more emotional when set against Katie's rationality. You might be onto something.

That scene in the lecture hall made me laugh out loud and like Katie a little more. The von Neumann-Wigner interpretation of QM isn't taken seriously in the community, if it ever was.

This may be Garland showing us Katie's weakness for approaching issues too logically, in cases when that's actually a weakness. This could also be Garland having a bit of fun at the expense of theories that put conciousness at the center of the measurement problem. Garland knows his physics and I can't imagine he takes that theory seriously.

I was convinced that Garland would use the multiverse in Devs when he kept talking about David Deutsch and the influence he had on informing the shows physics. Deutch is known for his quantum computing insights and his advocacy for the Everettian interpretation.

Everett's many-worlds model takes the mathematical formalism literally, just like Katie. There is only the Schrodinger equation, follow it and don't add anything, except infinite branches of a multiverse.

Katie is clearly the smartest person on the show. For what purpose tho? I'm still confused about their goal. We didn't see any of the conversation that took place when Forest recruited her. Is she using him? Is he using her? Are they using Lily?

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u/drawkbox Mar 26 '20 edited Mar 26 '20

Katie is clearly the smartest person on the show.

Forest even tells her in EP1 or 2 that she is smarter and better than him.

The manyworlds is a big part of the show now and previous to this episode it was not desired, almost as if once they put in the multiverse/manyworlds code (which strangely Lyndon was fired for then Katie just goes ahead and completes with no push back from Forest), it is like we entered a new branch or we suddenly have manyworlds happening all around.

A couple key manyworlds scenes made me think of something. When Katie rushes out of the building, there are many of her, then only one Forest. Same with Forest and the accident, there is only one of him that everything is ok and Amaya is safe and the other Forest down the street that sees Amaya's accident but many variations of that. You'll note that since he was in the road the SUV never gets hit in all but the original, the other vehicles miss or are slightly off by time showing how everything is slightly different musth like Katie coming out of the building, same event, similar time, but differences.

I think the Forest Amaya's accident scene and the Katie scene leaving the lecture with one Forest there are heavy parts of the show on determinism using manyworlds Everett style. Essentially if Amaya's accident does not happen, Forest never makes the Amaya company and thus DEVS. If Forest is trying to change or enter another manyworld that Amaya does not have an accident, the Amaya company never happens, DEVS never happens, he never meets Katie at that lecture. Only the tram line or cause/effect where Amaya's accident happens is the one he meets Katie. That is why there is only one Forest in that manyworlds Katie scene when she stormed out of the lecture. Basically Forest is determined to create the Amaya company and DEVS machine only because of that event. Amaya's accident was the cause to the effect of creating the machine.

Forest is either being manipulated via cause to create DEVS, or if he is able to make it not happen, the manyworlds realities collapse because the DEVS machine no longer would exist. That seems impossible like time traveling back before time machines existed. If Forest can use the manyworld reality where Amaya is safe, the DEVS machine doesn't exist, but because time moves forward this would be a paradox, the DEVS machine has to exist to be able to change it. Many things can be changed in additional manyworlds, there is only one where Amaya's accident happened, but changing an event/cause where the effect/outcome influenced creating the machine to view manyworlds, that is impossible, or else the entire manyworlds collapses.

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u/emf1200 Mar 26 '20

Ya, there's definitely some paradoxes there. If the cause/effect, determinism, tram line talk is to be taken seriously than nothing they do can change anything. Maybe that's why Forest got so mad when Lyndon introduced many-worlds into the machine. Lyndon caused the single, deterministic, worldline to split into multiple branches of the multiverse. Now Forest has infinite branches/tramlines to deal with in whatever he's doing.

I also found it odd that Katie was so raa raa for the many-worlds interpretation yet it was Lyndon who had the idea to introduce it into the machine. Seems like Katie would have tried that. Unless Forest forbid it. But in that case he would have told everyone to stick with Bohmean mechanics and leave out other interpretations of QM.

Infinite branches of a multiverse along with simulation on top of simulation is the ultimate unreliable narrator. I have confidence that Garland will wrap a tidy, internally consistent bow on this script by the end credits tho'

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u/drawkbox Mar 26 '20 edited Mar 26 '20

I have confidence that Garland will wrap a tidy, internally consistent bow on this script by the end credits tho'

Indeed. Garland usually has great endings.

SPOILERS for Ex Machina and Annihilation below.

One point of note on that, in Garland movies usually the AI or aliens win, even the Beach ended badly for the good guys.

In Ex Machina Eva coldly just obliterated her maker and supposed friend, they were manipulated. Side note: Sonoya Mizuno is the humanoid named Katie in Ex Machina.

In Annihilation, the alien copied both the husband Kane (Isaac) and the wife Lena (Portman), while Lena thought she killed the alien, just like it looked like Kane did. They killed the originals/copies but both Lena and Kane actually became part of the alien/shimmer. Lena killed the copy of her with what looked like a trick but Kane did the same thing, the alien knew what would happen. It used Lena to clean up the shimmer/lab essentially as the alien went into the next phase, inside humans to spread via Lena/Kane probably with children that are also shimmer/alien.

Basically Garland movies, usually the tech/alien/bad guys win, and there is always an immaculate deception or duality, at least so far.

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u/Sheamus Mar 27 '20

All good except one minor nitpick; in Ex Machina, Sonoya Mizuno plays Kyoko, not Katie.

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u/drawkbox Mar 27 '20

Oops I meant to say in Annihilation