the big bang theory~ how did we get here?

[MorpheusSandman]

sure but there is a succession of thoughts in that the cosmos/universe came into being because we were about to be if you see what I mean. humans and the universe are one interchangeable.

LOL No. The universe was here long before humans and will continue to be here long after humans. We are only one of the universe's great many farts. No more or less important than anything else that happens out there.

evolution if one is an evolutionist has to ask how life came into being before even remotely considering it and so without the universe life would not be.
I am an evolutionist by the way

LOL no. Evolution doesn't have to ask how life came into being because evolution only exists to address why life changes as it does. Abiogenisis addresses how life came into being, and there are many, many viable theories (one problem is our inability to know/replicate earth's environment from millions of years ago in order to test and see if life could arise in such an environment).

[cacian]

How interesting Morpheus because I see the universe and humans as one meaning one would not be without the other.
obviously if it was not for the universe humans would not be around they could not and therefore the opposite would apply logically.
for the universe to just be just does not correlate because for something to be it has to have a reason. everything has a reason. I tend to go with this feeling.
and for this reason I would say humans are responsible for the makeup and the origin of the universe. humans came first and because they needed somewhere to camp so to speak set up the background that is the universe.
a bit like saying a painter would set up its background in order to convey an image without the background there is no image.
a layout is the universe and humans are its image. humans reflect themselves through their background which is the planet otherwise they could not be.
for humans to be the universe must be and for it to be humans are it is two way situation.
that is of course how I interpret life in general of course I consider what you are saying and respect your views on the matter.

[mal4mac]

sure but there is a succession of thoughts in that the cosmos/universe came into being because we were about to be if you see what I mean. humans and the universe are one interchangeable.

So are you a believer in the Strong Anthropic principle?

"The Universe must have those properties which allow life to develop within it."

and/or the PAP?:

"Observers are necessary to bring the Universe into being."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

how did we get here?

I'm a great believer in SPAP, because it amuses me more than the other guesses. So this question cannot be asked in my universe. In SPAP, being here is fundamental, no use asking "how did we get here?"

Note my even more fundamental axioms... (i) adopt the most amusing scientific guess as your first principle... (ii) amusement is truth... Keats was almost right...

[YesNo]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

Very informative link, mal4mac. You mentioned SPAP, but I must have missed it in the link. What does it refer to?

[cacian]

So are you a believer in the Strong Anthropic principle?

"The Universe must have those properties which allow life to develop within it."

and/or the PAP?:

"Observers are necessary to bring the Universe into being."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

Hi mal4mac and thank you for posting.
it is interesting this theory but it is not quite what I am trying to say.
Anthropic is suggesting that life and the universe are compatible meaning they must have happened one after the other and one happened to match the other. ie like the perfect coincidence which I believe is not the case.
what I am trying to suggest is that one needs the other and that both happened at the same time or consecutively. life happened as the universe revolved around it at the same time. both are like a revolving door one does not turn without the other and vice versa.
the issue with anthropic is that it suggests that even if life is not about the universe carries on.
but with this theory the opposite effect does not apply ie life without the universe carries which cannot be the case. it is an impossibility.
In my theory/speculations I leaves no room for such error and so I suggest that life and the universe consequently revolved around each other. life is the activator the reason for the universe comes to be . it is like saying out of life is born a universe.
a great simile to it would be to compare it to a mother with a child. a child is born out of a mother and since we know that a child does not return to the womb to be born again, but continues in the same path ie reproduce more life, then the universe could not return to a state of vegetation either. what it does is go on expanding and adjusting according to life that takes place in and around it.
life is the universe and the universe is life. one cannot dissociate one from the other.
the same way one cannot dissociate a mother from a child they are related no matter what.

so we could describe the make up of the universe life it as a chain reaction:
life/ universe /life /universe /
the same would apply to:
mother /child/ then child to mother and then child and so on. it is the cycle of life.
life is the predictor of the universe and the universe is the predictor of life.
I prefer this sequence it is something that is observed in life our natural human life.

haha I hope this is not too confusing

[mal4mac]

Very informative link, mal4mac. You mentioned SPAP, but I must have missed it in the link. What does it refer to?

I liked both the S & P anthropic principles so I just banged them together! Actually, I guess P is what counts, so maybe we should just stick with PAP... that acronym is rather a hostage to "normal" scientists though

Hi mal4mac and thank you for posting.
it is interesting this theory but it is not quite what I am trying to say.
Anthropic is suggesting that life and the universe are compatible meaning they must have happened one after the other and one happened to match the other.

Look carefully at the different variations, I think what you are thinking of is the most boring version, the aptly called "Weak Anthropic Principle". Look at the interesting PAP, I think it is saying what you are saying

"Observers are necessary to bring the Universe into being."
Barrow and Tipler believe that this is a valid conclusion from quantum mechanics, as John Archibald Wheeler has suggested... and called the Participatory Anthropic Principle (PAP).

These are three big names in physics, especially Wheeler, Feynman's mentor, ...

what I am trying to suggest is that one needs the other and that both happened at the same time or consecutively. life happened as the universe revolved around it at the same time. both are like a revolving door one does not turn without the other and vice versa.

I think that's PAP, and certainly not pap

the issue with anthropic is that it suggests that even if life is not about the universe carries on.
but with this theory the opposite effect does not apply ie life without the universe carries which cannot be the case. it is an impossibility.

No PAP requires the observer, the universe would not just go on without the observer (P is for participation...)

In my theory/speculations I leaves no room for such error and so I suggest that life and the universe consequently revolved around each other. life is the activator the reason for the universe comes to be . it is like saying out of life is born a universe.

Sorry, it's Wheeler's theory, he got there first Good independent speculation though, he's good company... his autobiography is superb ("Space-time foam and geons" I think it's called...) He's a funny man, like Feynman, definitely both stars in my cosmicomics universe.

a great simile to it would be to compare it to a mother with a child. a child is born out of a mother and since we know that a child does not return to the womb to be born again, but continues in the same path ie reproduce more life, then the universe could not return to a state of vegetation either. what it does is go on expanding and adjusting according to life that takes place in and around it.

Great simile, well put, you should write a book about PAP, physicists write mostly pap when they popularise, you should do it for them...

haha I hope this is not too confusing

Not as confusing as most popular physics books... not confusing at all really...

[YesNo]

I liked both the S & P anthropic principles so I just banged them together! Actually, I guess P is what counts, so maybe we should just stick with PAP... that acronym is rather a hostage to "normal" scientists though

I did find PAP to be the more interesting of the Anthropic Principles in the article.

Recently I read Rupert Sheldrake's "The Science Delusion" and it introduced me to the idea of "morphic fields" as a way to reintroduce purpose into science as well as an older "cosmic egg" idea. I don't see how any universe given Brandon Carter's original Strong Anthropic Principle with multiverse could have ever got started.

[mal4mac]

But how does the observer evolve to do the observing? It can't, it must just be there, a "something" beyond the physical. But the only "something beyond the physical" that I'm certain of is me. So I must have created the universe! Just by observing. Good days work! Where's my bonus...

[YesNo]

I think "observing" is underrating the human activity. It is more like "observing with an intention or purpose of understanding", a purposeful observing. The anthropic principle should not just claim because we have observers we need a universe capable of allowing an observer to exist, but because we have purposeful observers we need a universe that allows purpose.

The way Sheldrake explained his "morphic field", it allowed purpose to all organized structures even atoms. Eventually the universe gets to us and we participate in the field of purpose (and memory, language, etc), but it has to have been doing something like that all along in order to get to us at all.

[mal4mac]

I think "observing" is underrating the human activity. It is more like "observing with an intention or purpose of understanding", a purposeful observing.

I don't see that, my first act of observation must have brought the universe into being... me hearing a heart beat in the womb might have been the first act of creation/observation*. So there wasn't really a purposeful observing there, was there? It looks like very passive observing to me.

PAP doesn't suggest the universe is purposeful. Why should it be?

I'm not sure about Sheldrake's "eventually the universe gets to us". No, in PAP, the observer is there first, there's "no eventually getting to us".

I am now starting to doubt that I was the creator/observer... a bit solipsistic maybe... Maybe the first conscious ape, call him "the PAP link", was the creator, and passed on his consciousness to all of us. Yes I like that better... I like to think that other people aren't just unconscious robots!

The PAP link hypothesis (PAPL) also explains why "there's no one out there", why with 10 thousand billion billion stars in the universe there are no aliens that have visited us from any of them! It's because there was only one observer who created the universe... our conscious fore-father...

* now I understand that baby in space scene from 2001!

[cacian]

hi mla4mac

* now I understand that baby in space scene from 2001!

which scene is this?

[YesNo]

I don't see that, my first act of observation must have brought the universe into being... me hearing a heart beat in the womb might have been the first act of creation/observation*. So there wasn't really a purposeful observing there, was there? It looks like very passive observing to me.

It may seem passive, but if there is some choice involved, such as should one move one's mouth or not, there would be purpose which would be the reason to make one choice over the other.

Although it doesn't even seem conscious, the atom may be considered to be purposeful as well. It is more of a process than a thing and the next position of the electron is something it would have to choose.

PAP doesn't suggest the universe is purposeful. Why should it be?

The reason to think it is purposeful is because we behave with purpose. That is, when we observe, we have goals whether it is where to get the next meal or why the universe works the way it does. Although PAP doesn't require purpose, we act with purpose, so an anthropic principal needs to provide a universe where purpose can occur. What better way than to have purpose from the very beginning with the simplest structures?

I'm not sure about Sheldrake's "eventually the universe gets to us". No, in PAP, the observer is there first, there's "no eventually getting to us".

I don't think Sheldrake accepts PAP. I was just providing him as another alternative.

I am now starting to doubt that I was the creator/observer... a bit solipsistic maybe... Maybe the first conscious ape, call him "the PAP link", was the creator, and passed on his consciousness to all of us. Yes I like that better... I like to think that other people aren't just unconscious robots!

Or a hydrogen atom. The "consciousness" is a bit odd, but the uncertainty allows for choice.

The PAP link hypothesis (PAPL) also explains why "there's no one out there", why with 10 thousand billion billion stars in the universe there are no aliens that have visited us from any of them! It's because there was only one observer who created the universe... our conscious fore-father...

* now I understand that baby in space scene from 2001!

I think there is other life out there, but I can see how PAP might not. I don't think they could reach us physically because the cosmic radiation would kill them if they tried.

[mal4mac]

It may seem passive, but if there is some choice involved, such as should one move one's mouth or not, there would be purpose which would be the reason to make one choice over the other.

But this act of observation is the very first act, so how would there be "a choice" - that requires some mental activity before the first act, by definition impossible.

The reason to think it is purposeful is because we behave with purpose. That is, when we observe, we have goals whether it is where to get the next meal or why the universe works the way it does. Although PAP doesn't require purpose, we act with purpose, so an anthropic principal needs to provide a universe where purpose can occur. What better way than to have purpose from the very beginning with the simplest structures?

Perhaps purpose could begin in the very first moment, but I don't see how you could get round observation preceding purpose.

I think there is other life out there, but I can see how PAP might not. I don't think they could reach us physically because the cosmic radiation would kill them if they tried.

Surely an advanced civilisation could create reasonable radiation shields? We can already, just about, detect earth like planets already, so why haven't they detected us and sent us a signal? It's 13.7 billion year since the big bang, why aren't there thousands of civilisations millions of years older than ours moving around, or sending out signals, to say "hello" to us younger civilisation.

Where are they?!

hi mla4mac

which scene is this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6umxthz1Ys

And is this the "PAP link"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtbOmpTnyOc

[cafolini]

But this act of observation is the very first act, so how would there be "a choice" - that requires some mental activity before the first act, by definition impossible.



Perhaps purpose could begin in the very first moment, but I don't see how you could get round observation preceding purpose.





Surely an advanced civilisation could create reasonable radiation shields? We can already, just about, detect earth like planets already, so why haven't they detected us and sent us a signal? It's 13.7 billion year since the big bang, why aren't there thousands of civilisations millions of years older than ours moving around, or sending out signals, to say "hello" to us younger civilisation.

Where are they?!

Not even puzzling or intriguing. The mystery is net, solid, unsolvable. This is not Agatha's question with the answer already inside. May the Grace of God be with you.

[mal4mac]

Not even puzzling or intriguing. The mystery is net, solid, unsolvable...

You don't find PAP intriguing? Fair enough, no one can say what you should find intriguing. I find it slightly intriguing, mildly amusing, something to jive around with in a thread for a few minutes. I don't know if 'origin of big bang' is unsolvable. What makes you say this? Someone said it was impossible to know what the stars were made of, then a few years later someone discovered spectroscopy.