Cosmology

[Dreamwoven]

I tend to agree with desiresjab on this.

[desiresjab]

Something would be amiss if I were not continually changing my views and adjusting the dial--I would be dead. But I live because I feel pity tinged with scorn for those with too much belief. An excess of belief always means this brain is closed for the business of vertical thought..

Too bad. I am old enough to have seen a few fine men fall into the maws of Jesus or Muhammad, only to emerge without their brains.

Family values and the golden rule et al--those are beliefs to keep forever. The search for ultimate truth is different. Shed views anytime the skin no longer fits.

For millennia we have had it rammed down our throats that to not believe is to suffer eternal death.

I might say, then,that belief is central to all religions because a clue is being given.

However, I have no such belief. I am merely looking things over. Aristotle said that the mark of an educated mind is the abilty to entertain a thought without accepting it. I want all my guests to be fully entertained at least once.

Why is the big entity reduced to clues? Believers scramble for an answer here. Why clues? I can hear the cries of free will now.

Maybe that keeps me free, it seems to have enslaved the big entity, though, who is unable to make a clear point without trickery and double talk.

[desiresjab]

What could such a clue even mean, entertaining for a moment the thought that all religion springs from truth? Let's see. Belief would have to be connected to some kind of quantum readiness state of our consciousness to ascend the fish ladder after death, for the clue to make any physical sense to my hillbilly mind.

Here is the mockery. The prized belief is in a God apparently worthy of no one's belief, an entity that tortures its children and makes bad excuses.

Someone tipped us off. Now I get it. God had to be sly, didn't he? For there is another entity, isn't there now? That is why God is as evil as good. The devil restrained his hand, even in his own Good Books.

So God is evil, then, but maybe slightly more positive than negative--for the clue did reach us after all...ahem!..

Even mathematics would be easier without ol' Beelzebub lurking inside God. God is eev-yil. God said so. We are in his image. The bad father loves us, though, and battles the eev-yil one who is but himself for our passage into the afterworld.

Why, sure.

[YesNo]

...some kind of quantum readiness state of our consciousness...

What is a "quantum readiness status of our consciousness" but another belief system?

[desiresjab]

What is a "quantum readiness status of our consciousness" but another belief system?

The connection between consciousness and quantum mechanics, if any, is nebulous. Now the psychology of quantum mechanics is completely theoretical, but at least reasonable. "Belief" as an important factor was speculative. A relatively clear conscience might be what is required, not belief at all. That might be the readiness state, since we know nil about this theoretical psychology.

[desiresjab]

If the universe came from nothingness, then nothingness is at least that which is capable of producing existence out of itself. It would appear even nothingness has potential, then. Nothingness+potential, but is that really nothingness? How about nothing without any potential whatsoever? Now that's nothingness.

Pure nothingness seems no more possible than pure randomness. Nothingness cannot expell its potentiality anymore than matter can expell the necessity of two following one. Is potential even more fundamental than the laws of math, or is it the other way around? If potential can precede existence, then maybe the laws of math can too? Maybe the laws of math exist as potential before existence itself, or maybe they precede and channel potential. The number of things existing before existence could start to pile up.

It is an interesting sidebar to note that Russel and Whitehead required 360 pages of Principia Mathematica to prove that two follows one. The proof was successful.

[YesNo]

Russell and Whitehead started with some assumptions, perhaps set-theoretic ones. They didn't start from nothing.

There are some problems I have with "nothing".

First, it seems to be a metaphor for a void in space, but the nothing that preceded our universe was not in space. Not only was there nothing, but there was no space either. That means there were no fields where a void could occur.

Second, focusing on nothing assumes that the universe happened in some reductionist way. That is, the only thing one had to work with was nothing.

Third, did consciousness exist during this period of nothingness? If it did then that would be the non-reductionist "something" out of which the universe could have arisen from "nothing".

[desiresjab]

Russell and Whitehead started with some assumptions, perhaps set-theoretic ones. They didn't start from nothing.

There are some problems I have with "nothing".

First, it seems to be a metaphor for a void in space, but the nothing that preceded our universe was not in space. Not only was there nothing, but there was no space either. That means there were no fields where a void could occur.

Second, focusing on nothing assumes that the universe happened in some reductionist way. That is, the only thing one had to work with was nothing.

Third, did consciousness exist during this period of nothingness? If it did then that would be the non-reductionist "something" out of which the universe could have arisen from "nothing".

I mention the proof of two following one because it has been a big part of the discussions here, not because I am trying to say something about the way the universe was formed out of nothing.

If anything existed--consciousness, potential, limits--it would qualify as something. One definite problem with nothingness is that we cannot quite get there in our imaginations. We can say the word itself, so we fall back on saying the word when imagination fails.

Existence is less problematical than nothingness, because we can self-verify the former. But nothingness is a concept only and fraught with paradox. Reductionist philosophy might require the universe to spring from nothing, my own definition of nothingness says that is impossible.

I could argue absolute nothingness cannot exist because it has not already occurred in infinite time. There is no imaginable way for nothingness to supplant existence, any more than there is for existence to supplant nothingness.

[YesNo]

If anything existed--consciousness, potential, limits--it would qualify as something. One definite problem with nothingness is that we cannot quite get there in our imaginations. We can say the word itself, so we fall back on saying the word when imagination fails.

Existence is less problematical than nothingness, because we can self-verify the former. But nothingness is a concept only and fraught with paradox. Reductionist philosophy might require the universe to spring from nothing, my own definition of nothingness says that is impossible.

I could argue absolute nothingness cannot exist because it has not already occurred in infinite time. There is no imaginable way for nothingness to supplant existence, any more than there is for existence to supplant nothingness.

Perhaps philosophically defining what "something" is should be done first. This would be the basis for scientific hypotheses that experiments could attempt to falsify. I would think "something" requires a space in which it can exist. Given that it might change, it also requires time to perform the change. So if one doesn't have space or time, then we cannot have "something". Does consciousness or potentiality require space and time?

Part of the problem is with the metaphors we use. They imply a preferred solution to a problem which may be leading us in the wrong direction.

I was reading a popular survey of quantum physics some time ago describing the wave pattern with the darker interference areas that a series of single photons made on a detection panel after going through a double slit. The article noted that if one measured which slit each photon went through then the wave pattern was destroyed. To get the wave pattern the article said that each photon split and went through both slits so it could interfere with itself. Now how would anyone know that? If they actually looked, they would only see one photon and the wave pattern would be gone. The idea of the photon splitting and going through both slits is only a kind of metaphor. It is philosophic speculation that tries to explain the evidence. Underlying that particular metaphor is a belief that "something" is nonetheless there causing the interference pattern.

[desiresjab]

Perhaps philosophically defining what "something" is should be done first. This would be the basis for scientific hypotheses that experiments could attempt to falsify. I would think "something" requires a space in which it can exist. Given that it might change, it also requires time to perform the change. So if one doesn't have space or time, then we cannot have "something". Does consciousness or potentiality require space and time?

Part of the problem is with the metaphors we use. They imply a preferred solution to a problem which may be leading us in the wrong direction.

I was reading a popular survey of quantum physics some time ago describing the wave pattern with the darker interference areas that a series of single photons made on a detection panel after going through a double slit. The article noted that if one measured which slit each photon went through then the wave pattern was destroyed. To get the wave pattern the article said that each photon split and went through both slits so it could interfere with itself. Now how would anyone know that? If they actually looked, they would only see one photon and the wave pattern would be gone. The idea of the photon splitting and going through both slits is only a kind of metaphor. It is philosophic speculation that tries to explain the evidence. Underlying that particular metaphor is a belief that "something" is nonetheless there causing the interference pattern.

I define nothingness as having no properties whatsover. It has no space, no time, no energy, no potential, and therefore could never produce anything.

An appropriate scientific definition might be a vacuum minus the cosmological constant for dark energy. That would effectively be a "vacuum within space." Vacuum is only along the road to nothingness.

We cannot well imagine nothingness, so maybe it does not really exist. Of course ancient peoples could not have well imagined curved space, no matter how they might have tried, and that did not stop it from existing.

Philosophy cannot answer scientific or mathematical questions. Whatever reality is, it is more strange than we think. Philosophically, Buddah got it right with the all is maya idea.

We are in the greatest scientific and mathematics explosion of all time. Collating it all is a gigantic problem. This why progress is traditionally slow in these fields. It takes the power of the greatest brains years or decades to decide what a new discovery even means in many cases, and to try and understand some of the implications.

Computers and instant communications sped this process up exponentially. The process will experience another exponential burst sooner rather than later, if we can hold on as a species. Cyborgs and quantum computers will lead us in directions undreamed of. You could feel confident betting on either one to begin showing up within twenty years.

I have felt lucky to have been born in an age relatively free of superstition where I can witness incredilbe discoveries. For freedom and quality of life I do not know if subsequent generations can match us, but discovery-wise the future is going to be the greatest show ever on earth, making our own progress seem quite pale and slow. Machines will be able to make the leap from theory to application exponentially faster by sorting through all discoveries. Many discoveries to make other discoveries may be lying in front of us now, unsorted, unrecognized for what they are and can do.

I predict the work of Ramanujan will play a further part yet. Some of his formulae are as magical as incantations.

[YesNo]

I define nothingness as having no properties whatsover. It has no space, no time, no energy, no potential, and therefore could never produce anything.

That is how I see it also. Our universe could not have originated from nothing. However, I don't see why consciousness requires space, time, energy or potential. It could be the only eternal reality.

An appropriate scientific definition might be a vacuum minus the cosmological constant for dark energy. That would effectively be a "vacuum within space." Vacuum is only along the road to nothingness.

Unfortunately this concept of "nothing" assumes the presence of space. The word "vacuum" is not an adequate substitute for "nothing".

We cannot well imagine nothingness, so maybe it does not really exist. Of course ancient peoples could not have well imagined curved space, no matter how they might have tried, and that did not stop it from existing.

Philosophy cannot answer scientific or mathematical questions. Whatever reality is, it is more strange than we think. Philosophically, Buddah got it right with the all is maya idea.

What we think of as "something" may well all be maya. What we are doing right now is philosophy.

[desiresjab]

First Principle is unknown. From First Principle evolved many beings. Some of them were gods to us. Heirarchies of gods in meta realities that barely intersect came into being. The gods who created us are as ingonrant as we of First Principle. We were a tabletop exercise for them. They suspect they may be the same.

If we share physics with no other beings, what could we share with their meta reality? Only the highest grade of information, perhaps. Along the nodes of the Riemann zeta function in complex numbers in multi-dimensional space, perhaps they have multi-dimensional message boxes. Fanciful.

Many famous problems were solved last century, but no paradigm shifts have come yet. Usually a physical theory causes the shift, for which the mathematics is found to already exist. An exception was calculus, which provided its own impetus for a couple of centuries.

[YesNo]

Some paradigm shifts in cosmology from the last century are the existences of galaxies other than our own and the big bang.

[desiresjab]

Some paradigm shifts in cosmology from the last century are the existences of galaxies other than our own and the big bang.

Yes. Edwin Hubble ranks with anyone for impact. His was the kind of discovery that others were brainy enough to have made, but he was there at the right time with the right instrument. Other discoveries like the invention calculus or relativity require a super genius and nothing less.

[YesNo]

I picked up Milton A. Rothman's "Discovering the Natural Laws" in a used bookstore in Door County, Wisconsin, recently. He has two points he wants to make. First, he wants to show the empirical evidence for the laws of physics in order to justify those laws which is the main reason I'm reading the book. Second, he wants to discredit his own consciousness. He doesn't put the part about consciousness in those terms, but that's how I read it.

Anyway, he writes this about how the laws of physics have not changed (and I admit, for practical purposes, it is a useful assumption we might as well make):

"Thus we know, by direct evidence, that the laws which operate here and now are the same laws that existed early in the history of the universe. They have not changed in all the time that has elapsed since very soon after the beginning." (page 209)

Because of that beginning, we can't say "we know" the laws have not changed, or rather, that the universe is actually following the laws we think it is.