The Universe as a Learning System

At its microscopic level, the universe follows the laws of quantum mechanics. Focusing on the quantum trajectories of particles as followed from the hydrodynamical formulation of quantum mechanics, we propose that under general requirements, quantum systems follow a disrupted version of the gradient descent model, a basic machine learning algorithm, where the learning is distorted due to the self-organizing process of the quantum system. Such a learning process is possible only when we assume dissipation, i.e., that the quantum system is open. The learning parameter is the time increment of the process over the mass of the quantum particle, and a friction parameter determines the nonlinearity of the quantum system. We then provide an empirical demonstration of the proposed model.