The Logic that Suggests all Serious Physicists Believe in God

[Royce]

But aren't photon pure energy and don't photons exist? Aren't electromagnetic waves pure energy yet they too exist? So how can Davies or anyone rightfully say that energy is just a concept? It can be shown to exist and have physical effects on physical matter. We may not know what it is or how to define it, but surely we know that it is?

 

[loseyourname]

Energy exists in much the same way that redness exists. Neither is, strictly speaking, a real property of objects. Redness, as such, is not 'out there in the world,' but rather exists only in our minds. We label as "red" objects that have a propensity for reflecting the particular waves of light that incite the sensation of redness in our minds. That isn't to say that energy exists only in our minds - in fact, this might not even be the best analogy, but it was the best I could think up in five seconds. Nonetheless, the analogy can be useful. There are real actions that material objects take, such as translational and rotational motion. Insofar as all energy can be reduced to either kinetic energy or potential energy, what we call "energy" is simply our labelling of the capacity of material objects to undergo translational and/or rotational motion. This "capacity" does not have a real existence; its existence is conceptual. It is a useful mathematical quantity that can be placed into equations to help us predict the behavior of physical systems.

It should be noted that my description here is a gross oversimplification and is based somewhat on outdated Newtonian views of physical systems. The reduction of all of physics to a science of motion probably began to die all the way back with Hobbes. Nonetheless, the reasoning remains the same whatever name you substitute in for "motion." Energy is simply a way in which we track the capacity for certain tranformations that a physical system can undergo.

The flaw in the logic of the original post is twofold. First, the concept energy is a concept insofar as it is thought by men. The capacity for transformation itself is generally agreed to have pre-existed intelligent thought, but the concept of energy as a quantification of this capacity did not. The second flaw in the logic is in the assumption that all of physics rests on a notion of substance. While men such as Aristotle and Spinoza were able to utilize this notion to suggest or prove the existence of God, modern physics does not rely upon this notion. Modern physics relies simply upon relations. The terminology of physics can be thought of as referring to the propensity for mathematical quantities to behave in a predictable manner when measurements are taken. Science can essentially be thought of as instrumentalism in this sense. It describes systematic regularities in our perception and theoretical entities such as electrons and photons and energy give illustrative effect to these regularities. That said, just about every physicist probably believes that physical theories do correspond in some meaningful way, aside from predictive power, to objective reality. The fact remains, however, that such a belief, as reasonable as it may be, is a metaphysical proposition that cannot be proven within physics. The belief in a material substratum that acts as one of the foundational elements in a physical ontology is also a metaphysical belief, even if physics textbooks do seem to teach this belief.

Now actual physicists may or may not be instrumentalists, but the fact is that instrumentalism is a viable view of physics. Looked at in this way, the initial premise that all of physics is grounded upon the existence of matter and energy is false and the conclusion that physics presupposes God is also false. There are other flaws that occur to me prima facie even in thinking that a belief in a material substratum presupposes God, but I will not explore those, as this should be sufficient.

 

[Les Sleeth]

But aren't photon pure energy and don't photons exist? Aren't electromagnetic waves pure energy yet they too exist? So how can Davies or anyone rightfully say that energy is just a concept? It can be shown to exist and have physical effects on physical matter. We may not know what it is or how to define it, but surely we know that it is?

I have previously argued here that photons are not pure energy. If you energize a photon, it vibrates faster, it's wavelength shortens . . . if it loses energy, just the opposite happens. Because of those variables, one might imagine that once a photon yields all it's energy, it would cease to exist as an entity.

However, how do you explain the fact that a photon, no matter what you do to its energy, travels at c? If a photon were nothing but energy, then c should decrease when energy decreases, but it doesn't. Therefore, it appears a photon has properties (or one anyway) distinct from its energy. It is "something" which can take on or yield energy, but it isn't only energy.

Regarding energy being just a concept, don't take that too seriously. I was teasing, as I've said several times. What I am trying to point out is that energy is a measurement of movement/change/work done; mass is a measurement too.

The energy-mass dynamic seems to pretty much determine what we get to observe in the universe. But what is it that is moving and has mass? No concept there. All I'm pointing out is that we don't have a concept for that, and wondering why.

Thinkers like Spinoza, Mach, Bertrand Russel and William James all seemed to recognize the same problem, which is why I am trying to change the question of this thread (for a new thread) to something ontological. I'm working on that concept now, maybe you'll comment.

 

[Les Sleeth]

The flaw in the logic of the original post is twofold. First, the concept energy is a concept insofar as it is thought by men . . . the second flaw in the logic is in the assumption that all of physics rests on a notion of substance.

Is that what you think I'm saying, "[it is] a concept insofar as it is thought by men"? If I thought that insightful I'd be too embarrassed to admit it. And your second statement, "the assumption that all of physics rests on a notion of substance" . . . well, I didn't say that, but it does seem that physicists tend to insist they are describing the real "substantial" world, and anything nonphysical is insubstantial and/or unverifiable speculation.

Consider it from this angle. Isn't the basis of empiricism observability? Do you think anything would be observable if it didn't have substance? If you disagree, then give me one example, just one, of something observed that doesn't involve substance. And if you are going to insist substance isn't a central requirement of physics, then explain how you are going to do science without observation.

Energy exists in much the same way that redness exists. Neither is, strictly speaking, a real property of objects. Redness, as such, is not 'out there in the world,' but rather exists only in our minds. We label as "red" objects that have a propensity for reflecting the particular waves of light that incite the sensation of redness in our minds. That isn't to say that energy exists only in our minds - in fact, this might not even be the best analogy, but it was the best I could think up in five seconds. Nonetheless, the analogy can be useful. There are real actions that material objects take, such as translational and rotational motion. Insofar as all energy can be reduced to either kinetic energy or potential energy, what we call "energy" is simply our labelling of the capacity of material objects to undergo translational and/or rotational motion. This "capacity" does not have a real existence; its existence is conceptual. It is a useful mathematical quantity that can be placed into equations to help us predict the behavior of physical systems.

It should be noted that my description here is a gross oversimplification and is based somewhat on outdated Newtonian views of physical systems. The reduction of all of physics to a science of motion probably began to die all the way back with Hobbes. Nonetheless, the reasoning remains the same whatever name you substitute in for "motion." Energy is simply a way in which we track the capacity for certain tranformations that a physical system can undergo.

The flaw in the logic of the original post is twofold. First, the concept energy is a concept insofar as it is thought by men. The capacity for transformation itself is generally agreed to have pre-existed intelligent thought, but the concept of energy as a quantification of this capacity did not. The second flaw in the logic is in the assumption that all of physics rests on a notion of substance. While men such as Aristotle and Spinoza were able to utilize this notion to suggest or prove the existence of God, modern physics does not rely upon this notion. Modern physics relies simply upon relations. The terminology of physics can be thought of as referring to the propensity for mathematical quantities to behave in a predictable manner when measurements are taken. Science can essentially be thought of as instrumentalism in this sense. It describes systematic regularities in our perception and theoretical entities such as electrons and photons and energy give illustrative effect to these regularities. That said, just about every physicist probably believes that physical theories do correspond in some meaningful way, aside from predictive power, to objective reality. The fact remains, however, that such a belief, as reasonable as it may be, is a metaphysical proposition that cannot be proven within physics. The belief in a material substratum that acts as one of the foundational elements in a physical ontology is also a metaphysical belief, even if physics textbooks do seem to teach this belief.

Now actual physicists may or may not be instrumentalists, but the fact is that instrumentalism is a viable view of physics. Looked at in this way, the initial premise that all of physics is grounded upon the existence of matter and energy is false and the conclusion that physics presupposes God is also false. There are other flaws that occur to me prima facie even in thinking that a belief in a material substratum presupposes God, but I will not explore those, as this should be sufficient.

LYN, I am going to take this opportunity voice my objections, not to your points, but to your tone. You write like you are majorly educated in any subject you take on, and that we should accept your views as authoritative.

But isn't the truth that you are 20-something and not even out of college yet? Why do you present yourself as an all-knowing expert when you are a student both academically and of life? Geez, at 58 I still think of myself as a student, so it is hard to tolerate your condescending tone. Too often it seems like you state your opinions like they are facts, and you name/concept drop without explaining to us their relevance or what terms mean . . . almost like you are throwing out undigested stuff from your textbooks and websites you visit.

I'd be far more open if rather than trying to present yourself as the top genius of PF philosophy, you exhibited a bit of humility with your otherwise intelligent comments.

 

[metacristi]

Energy is a concept. No existential properties are allowed to be assigned to it.

If energy is an imaginary concept, the essence of mass is an imaginary concept.

A concept is a thought.

If energy is a thought, mass is a thought. A thought requires a thinker. The thinker proposed powerful enough to manifest the universe is God.

The prevalent view among physicists/philosophers is that mass and energy are two equivalent properties of physical systems (considered real properties, at least provisionally), in the vast majority of philosophical accounts 'energy' is not seen as a 'substance' (this view is much more difficult to defend). Strictly speaking mass does not transform into energy, they are merely two equivalent properties of 'physical systems'.

The concept proved very frutiful so far so that, at least provisionally, scientists are fully entitled to think at energy as being a real property of physical systems. Anyway even if energy were only a mere fruitful theoretical concept (and strongly that all concepts in physics/science are frutiful conventions) this in no way implies that a personal God creates the universe.

Indeed anti-realism does not necessarily imply ontological idealism of the Berkeleyan/lifegazer type which needs God, see the kantian epistemological idealism (strong epistemological anti realism) for example, which retain realism/naturalism only that we cannot perceive the 'noumena'/reality in itself.

Now an interesting question is what are 'physical systems' ultimately? The best model for 'physical' systems we have so far is given by the so called 'quantum fields', which synthesize both the wave and particle aspects. Well there are now good prospects to develop this program further and explain even why physical 'things' have mass.

Grand Unified Theories (GUT, there are more slightly different variants possible, the actual data cannot yet indicate a single one) postulate that the observed diversity, the different properties of the atomic particles are due to the so called symmetry breaking process which occurred immediately after Big Bang when the temperature lowered enough (there are more breaking points, gravity split first and later the other fundamental 'forces'). Above a certain energy (GUT theories postulate) there is no difference, unification appears.

The process of symmetry breaking is postulated to be due to the so called Higgs fields, in the majority of GUT no less than 24 Higgs fields (each with its own 'quanta of field', there are more Higgs particles postulated to exist) are needed to account for this symmetry breaking (the fields accounting for inflation, the so called inflaton fields are Higgs type fields but are different from the Higgs fields responsible for symmetry breaking).

Still early days but GUT (or superunification at which loop quantum gravitation and string theories attempt) seems to be a good path, a promising step ahead in our quest to find a TOE (theory of everything) without free parameters (if this is accomplished then the only intepretation of 'bon sens', to quote Duhem, were to say that such a TOE is approximately true).

As a final conclusion merely speculating the fact that science is always provisional, that we do not even have the definitive answers to such simple, common sense at first sight, questions like 'what is physical?' (the 'quantum field' approach is only the best existing model so far, having a fallible epistemological privilege, provisionally accepted as scientific knowledge) is far from being enough to claim that God exists and that all would be rational people should believe this (as unfortunately lifegazer do[es]-by the way he's very active now on a skeptic site I frequent trying to persuade them, in vain of course :-) ). This by no means amount to say that a God does not exist or that people do not have the right to believe, as an entirely personal choice, in a personal God.

 

[Les Sleeth]

. . . having a fallible epistemological privilege, provisionally accepted as scientific knowledge) is far from being enough to claim that God exists and that all would be rational people should believe this (as unfortunately lifegazer do-by the way he's very active now on a skeptic site I frequent trying to persuade them, in vain of course :-) ). Of course this by no means amount to say that a God does not exist or that people do not have the right to believe, as an entirely personal choice, in a personal God.

Metacristi, your thinkng is lucid, as always. When I made up this thread, the mentor (Hypnagogue) wrote me privately that it wasn't clear that my point was logic, and now I agree. I don't think anything I reasoned in the opening post adds up to the conclusion (physicists must believe in God). What I was trying to do in a lighthearted way was suggest that there seems to be no "absolute foundation" to what science deems substantial.

I was trying to ask, isn't it more logical to posit some sort of base substance of which everything is a form of? Instead, everyone started talking about God, which I see as my fault for not being straightforward with my point.

I've been trying to prepare a new thread that asks if neutral monism (or a variation of it) has theoretical possibilities. Maybe you comment there when I get it ready.

 

[metacristi]

Metacristi, your thinkng is lucid, as always. When I made up this thread, the mentor (Hypnagogue) wrote me privately that it wasn't clear that my point was logic, and now I agree. I don't think anything I reasoned in the opening post adds up to the conclusion (physicists must believe in God). What I was trying to do in a lighthearted way was suggest that there seems to be no "absolute foundation" to what science deems substantial.

I was trying to ask, isn't it more logical to posit some sort of base substance of which everything is a form of? Instead, everyone started talking about God, which I see as my fault for not being straightforward with my point.

I've been trying to prepare a new thread that asks if neutral monism (or a variation of it) has theoretical possibilities. Maybe you comment there when I get it ready.

I hope I understood you better this time...Lifegazer's philosophy is a form of idealist monist pantheism not too far from the 'Brahman-Brahma' set of the hindus, identified with God (we existing in God's mind, 'all that is'). The crux of the matter is that in this approach the 'ultimate substance' has the property of being conscious, that only God exist (or alternatively that we are God too). This is enough far from merely suggesting that a form of monism (which does not necessarily imply a conscious being) could be true or accepting provisionally a form of monism as fallible scientific knowledge. This is why I interpreted your question as bringing God into equation.

Today we cannot talk of a 'single substance', moreover as you observed even the classical, common sense, notion of substance seems to have lost meaning at quantum level. However we can still identify matter with 'quantum fields', though devoided by its common sense meaning. Unfortunately even here we cannot talk of a single form of quantum fields. Not yet at least. Thus we cannot talk yet of a monism.

From all we know currently, there is no good reason to 'to posit some sort of [single] base substance of which everything is a form of' as being provisional scientific knowledge. Maybe after successfuly developping a theory of everything achieving superunification (but it is not at all granted that a TOE will support monism). Of course it is still logically possible that monism is correct, I find this metaphysical thesis meaningful. If monism is held entirely as a philosophical doctrine, without epistemological claims (that it has to be introduced in science) I see no problem.

As about the foundations of science, well, as Popper put it well, the foundations of science lie on a swampy terrain, science is always provisional and corrigible. Even its basic assumptions (one of them is realism) are not incorrigible. Indeed both the foundationalist and coherentist theories of knowledge have serious problems, basically we cannot talk of sure knowledge developed step by step from a set of premises known to be true (the dream of Aristotle).

But from a scientist's standpoint though idealism cannot be rejected we just have more logical reasons now to prefer realism as a corrigible basis for science (well a weak form of realism, in my view not all fruitful unobservables posited by our successful scientfic theories do exist in reality). So even if we exist in reality in God's mind in the light of current situation logic indicate the actual assumptions/theories of science (accepted provisionally/considered corrigible) as having the most 'pro' arguments; thus they are accepted, at least for the moment, as the standard of knowledge (though of course a postmodernist or a supporter of Feyerabend will disagree).

 

[spicerack]

pardon my intrusion so late in the piece and even the relevence of my post but I'd always thought 2 things can occupy the same space just not at the same time ?

The logic seems to me that science cannot discount God as a first cause and that all serious physicists are on a quest to rule out that scenario

BTW Les I thought you were a bit harsh on loseyourname and that it was totally uncalled for. Expect karmic repercussions you big meanie

 

[Royce]

Les, I know your writing well enough to know that you were just teasing. Your post was well done and I enjoyed it. I just added my own confusion into the mix. It seems to me that all physicist have to have multiple personalities to deal with classic Newtonian physics, quantum physics and relativity all at the same time as None of them are completely compatible with the other.

I made the mistake not too long ago of saying that classical physics had been shown to be wrong. I was immediately and properly chastised for committing such an unpardonable sin. It seems that Newtonian physics is 100% complete and absolutely correct..er...ah...most of the time. Relativity is 100% absolutely complete and correct ...er...ah some of the time and that
Quantum physics is 100% absolutely complete and correct all of the time but nobody understands it and it doesn't matter because it doesn't effect anything in the real (macro) world anyway. (I'm paraphrasing what I have read here and other places.) It seems that the more I read and understand the more confused, ignorant and yes naive I become. Anyway good job and I look forward to your new thread.

 

[Les Sleeth]

I hope I understood you better this time...Lifegazer's philosophy is a form of idealist monist pantheism . . .

I liked Lifegazer's passion, but I was truly and totally kidding about suggesting he was right. I oppose idealism everytime I see it.

From all we know currently, there is no good reason to 'to posit some sort of [single] base substance of which everything is a form of' as being provisional scientific knowledge. Maybe after successfuly developping a theory of everything achieving superunification (but it is not at all granted that a TOE will support monism).

It's true we have no scientific basis for promoting any sort of monism since no such single substance has been observed. The point I'll make in my thread (if I ever get it done), however, will be that the only thing that makes the monistic substance appear is when it concentrates sufficiently. Before that it is dispersed far too finely to ever be observed by the rather "substantial" machinery (including our own senses) we employ to help us observe.

Of course it is still logically possible that monism is correct, I find this metaphysical thesis meaningful. If monism is held entirely as a philosophical doctrine, without epistemological claims (that it has to be introduced in science) I see no problem.

Agreed, except for one small point. As I've stated a great many times here at PF, there are people who've learned to quiet their mind to the point that they become aware of a sort of bright, omnipresent "substance." We might, in the sense of the phenomenologist's eidetic reflection, consider those meditators as having valid epistemological input.

However, the problem is that few who debate here know anything about this, and so I've been quite unsuccessful in getting that admitted as evidence for substance monism. So I agree that a monistic discussion will have to be primarily a philosophical exercise given the lack of epistemological consensus among the participants here.

 

[Les Sleeth]

BTW Les I thought you were a bit harsh on loseyourname and that it was totally uncalled for. Expect karmic repercussions you big meanie

Possibly, but it's too late to edit it, and I doubt if you know the history of our interaction. We've not been getting along. Besides the reasons I stated above, I haven't cared for his responses to myself and others I've considered insulting or downright nasty. At this point I feel intolerant, so maybe the best thing would be for he and I to steer clear of each other.

 

[Les Sleeth]

It seems that the more I read and understand the more confused, ignorant and yes naive I become.

Ahh, the voice of wisdom.

I look forward to your new thread.

I thought it would easier to lay it out than it's turning out to be. I'll work on it today and see what happens.

 

[metacristi]

Agreed, except for one small point. As I've stated a great many times here at PF, there are people who've learned to quiet their mind to the point that they become aware of a sort of bright, omnipresent "substance." We might, in the sense of the phenomenologist's eidetic reflection, consider those meditators as having valid epistemological input.

However, the problem is that few who debate here know anything about this, and so I've been quite unsuccessful in getting that admitted as evidence for substance monism. So I agree that a monistic discussion will have to be primarily a philosophical exercise given the lack of epistemological consensus among the participants here.

This is an interesting topic Les, do mystical experiences have any sort of epistemological value (at least a purely subjective, personal one)? In the late 1920s (before returning to England) Wittgenstein discussed exactly this problem with Schlick and Carnap, two of the most important logical positivists (in private, not at the meetings of the Vienna Circle).

At the time the Vienna Circle members were studying Wittgenstein's 'Tractatus' and were interested to hear from the man himself if their interpretation was correct. Well it resulted that while both parts agreed that verificationism can make the demarcation between [sense/nonsense + science/metaphysics] and that it is incoherent to talk of a purely private language Wittgenstein sustained additionally that mystical experiences are meaningful (possible expressing an absolute truth, the ultimate level of reality, God) though they cannot be expressed in words. That is that the experiences are meaningful/real for the experiencer but the language translations of the experiences are meaningless!

Carnap wrote in his memoirs that it was surprised to hear this from him, they had believed previously that Wittgenstein shared their view that religion as whole is meaningless, pure fictional metaphysics, including private experiences. It has to be said that the members of the Vienna Circle were already at that time supporters of physicalism which reject strong psychologism, holding that everything, even subjective experiences, [must] be interpreted via physical processes. This positivistic stance regarding mystical experiences/subjective experiences is strongly held in almost its entirety even today by a majority of skeptics/atheists (I've experienced this myself on different forums :-) ). They hold that all rational people should identify the so called 'mystical experiences' with brain functioning, nothing more than mere illusions without any epistemological content. This even if the subjective/theistic interpretations are only provisionally accepted by the percievers, entirely on a strictly personal basis (that is there is no claim that they [the 'theistic' interpretations] are part of science or that all rational people should believe the same).

Personally I cannot share their optimism here, as matter of fact science does not have yet a clear answer (what is consciousness?, we are rather at the beginning of our quest). Reliabilism (the actual scientific method 'worked' very well previously being very reliable whilst subjective experiences are usually not reliable) is not enough to claim that we have the good answer/later orthodox science will give an answer or that all rational people should interpret their subjective experiences with necessity on the line of scientific orthodoxy. So in my view mystical experiences do have epistemological content at least for the perciever (preferable held as fallible, basically counting as their personal research 'program') though in any case can we say that such experiences are enough to accept their theistic interpretation inside actual science.

 

[CaptainQuaser]

Logic is Illogical

Logic by its very nature is constrictive and inadequate. It is a human concept that tries to justify the universe. To believe that a lump of mass that is infinitely small in the scope of the universe if able to create logical constructions to understand the universe is preposterous. Than to go further and assume there is a creator and assume to can logically prove or disprove its existence is, well, illogical.

Using your precious logic we assume that you cannot fit more stuff in a container than it is able to hold.

There is more universe out there than there is sub-atomic particles in your brain, let alone neurons.

Knowledge of the universe cannot fit in your brain.

Any logical conclusions based on the universe will be made on inadequate data and false or unsubstantiated assumptions. Because our ability to test the universe is infinitely small, therefore our margin of error must be infinitely large.

Therefore, we can’t actually know anything. Just like in the quantum world, knowledge is never true, it’s just more likely to be true than false in the familiar circumstances it is applied to.

 

[Tournesol]

There is more universe out there than there is sub-atomic particles in your brain, let alone neurons.

Knowledge of the universe cannot fit in your brain.

So much for redundancy.

 

[Paul Martin]

Knowledge of the universe cannot fit in your brain.

Seems true enough to me.

A more striking example might be to wonder if the knowledge of how to build so many variations of a spider web, depending on unpredictable circumstances, can fit in the brain of the spider. Some of those spider brains are pretty small. Or whether the knowledge of how to migrate thousands of miles can fit in the brain of a Monarch butterfly, which is also pretty small.

In light of this, it seems to me that we should not rule out the possibility that knowledge is not resident in the brain after all. Just as the music and program content that comes out of a radio is not resident in the radio.

Paul

 

[selfAdjoint]

Seems true enough to me.

A more striking example might be to wonder if the knowledge of how to build so many variations of a spider web, depending on unpredictable circumstances, can fit in the brain of the spider. Some of those spider brains are pretty small. Or whether the knowledge of how to migrate thousands of miles can fit in the brain of a Monarch butterfly, which is also pretty small.

In light of this, it seems to me that we should not rule out the possibility that knowledge is not resident in the brain after all. Just as the music and program content that comes out of a radio is not resident in the radio.

Paul

The spider does not have to have knowledge of all possible webs to build one, any more than a planet has to solve differentiial equations in order to move in its orbit. The spider has a little web-building program in its brain. Different sppecies of spider have slightly different different programs, and the result of "running" those programs, given all the immediate variables each differnet time, gives a slightly different web, but belonging to that species' style.

We don't have to have all the knowledge in the world, only enought to live our lives. Our brains can hold a lot of knowledge; Chou En-Lai was trained in classical Chinese literature, so he had in his brain full identifiers of some 50 to 100,00 characters, with interpretative detail, and he was also a talented politician, who had in his brain about the same number of people's names, bios, and greet information (wife's name, current job, last job, evaluation as a party member, etc.). That's a bunch of data, and he not only held it in his 10^10 synapses but he could retrieve any item to consciousness in a fraction of a second.

 

[Paul Martin]

The spider does not have to have knowledge of all possible webs to build one, any more than a planet has to solve differentiial equations in order to move in its orbit. The spider has a little web-building program in its brain. Different sppecies of spider have slightly different different programs, and the result of "running" those programs, given all the immediate variables each differnet time, gives a slightly different web, but belonging to that species' style.

If you have some programming experience, which I suspect you do, take some time to watch a few spiders build their webs. Then try to design a "little web-building program" that would do the same thing. Then come up with an explanation of how that program might be stored in that little brain and how it got programmed in the first place.

I expect that your explanation for how the program got written will be that it evolved by trial and error in myriad spiders over eons of time and the programs that worked best propagated into successive generations. Now try to imagine if that technique could really work for software development. It doesn't make sense to me. I suspect there is quite a bit more going on.

We don't have to have all the knowledge in the world, only enought to live our lives. Our brains can hold a lot of knowledge; Chou En-Lai was trained in classical Chinese literature, so he had in his brain full identifiers of some 50 to 100,00 characters, with interpretative detail, and he was also a talented politician, who had in his brain about the same number of people's names, bios, and greet information (wife's name, current job, last job, evaluation as a party member, etc.). That's a bunch of data, and he not only held it in his 10^10 synapses but he could retrieve any item to consciousness in a fraction of a second.

With your understanding of information storage and retrieval technology, can you explain how synapses can serve that function? It doesn't make sense to me. And even if we could identify the information storage mechanisms in the brain, I think there is still a great mystery about how the mechanism got programmed. Hardware and data are one thing; functioning software is quite another. (Don't forget to consider that however that programming gets done, it varies considerably between individuals and it is very adaptable to experience of and damage
to the organism and brain.)

Paul

P.S. BTW, how come you didn't answer my question about observations of irrational real number values in nature? It was a real question.

 

[selfAdjoint]

I expect that your explanation for how the program got written will be that it evolved by trial and error in myriad spiders over eons of time and the programs that worked best propagated into successive generations. Now try to imagine if that technique could really work for software development. It doesn't make sense to me. I suspect there is quite a bit more going on.

You never heard of genetic programming ? http://www.doc.ic.ac.uk/~nd/surprise_96/journal/vol4/cs11/report.html ?

 

[Fliption]

You never heard of genetic programming ? http://www.doc.ic.ac.uk/~nd/surprise_96/journal/vol4/cs11/report.html ?

I actually think Paul has a very good point. I wouldn't say that I believe "something else is going on" just yet. I'm still open to the possibilities. It shouldn't be surprising that there are things like genetic programming going on. The question is, what has it gotten us? The response that says it took billions of years for nature to create what it has, doesn't seem like a very good response because in the computer world it seems we could speed up the process of mutation/selection way beyond that of nature. The limit here is computing power not the speed of mother nature.

I don't think there is any doubt that natural selection works and that if used in computers it could result in something. The question is "Can it alone explain life as we know it?". If it can then it seems these computer programs ought to be performing miracles very soon.

 

[Tournesol]

Or there was never anything miraculous about life in the first place.

 

[Fliption]

Or there was never anything miraculous about life in the first place.

When used as a figure of speech, it is quite appropriate as a characterization of life.

 

[jackle]

I’ve quoted science writer Paul Davies before writing in his book Superforce about energy, “When an abstract concept becomes so successful that it permeates through to the general public, the distinction between real and imaginary becomes blurred. . . . This is what happened in the case of energy. . . . Energy is . . . an imaginary, abstract concept which nevertheless has become so much a part of our everyday vocabulary that we imbue it with concrete existence.”

I don't know who Paul Davies is, but assuming he holds the opinions common to most physicists he is probably stating that Energy is a human concept.

...

If energy is a thought, mass is a thought. A thought requires a thinker.

But at this stage in your logic chain, the thinkers are probably already known, people, particularly physicists.

The thinker proposed powerful enough to manifest the universe is God.

God would have to have a concept of energy because of the way the universe behaves. I'm sure it wouldn't be the same as ours though.