What does it mean to call the universe a fixed-point solver?
A fixed point is an object returned unchanged by a specified map: applying F to x gives x again. A solver searches for an object satisfying that condition. OPH's closure proposal asks for a history whose internally recovered description, when realized, reproduces the same observations and interventions. A Sudoku is an accessible analogy: the finished grid simultaneously satisfies the row, column, box and clue constraints. A solver's sequence of guesses is different from the grid's defining relations. Likewise, no external clock has to run a universe-wide search before time begins. Different maps can have no fixed point, one or many. Writing the equation supplies a constraint; constructing the inhabited physical solution supplies the substantive work.
See also If reality is a fixed point, is everything predestined?, Does describing a universe make it exist?, Isn't a self-creating universe circular?
Also in Chapter 10: Why Doesn't It Matter Who Goes First?, Chapter 37: Why Does the Loop Have No Beginning?.
This answer comes from OPH, Observer Patch Holography. OPH is a rigorous, consistent and complete description of the unified, self-creating computational Universe we inhabit. Its consistency is machine-checked: the fixed point at its core is constructed explicitly, and a theory with a model contains no contradiction.
To understand OPH and check every step yourself, start with the free book Reverse Engineering Reality. It builds the theory from the ground up, and the OPH Notebook answers your questions while you read.
read the free bookask the notebookor ask sage:read chapter 2: Why Is There Anything Rather Than Nothing?watch a universe make its own particles