What is the role of life in the universe?

[marcus]

What is the role of turkeys in the universe?

Your question could be turned around to ask "what is the role of the universe in turkeys?"

... The question also puts turkey-awareness as a secondary phenomena, which if one subscribes to the turkey principal is unrealistic.

...

Let us be specific when we talk about life. Let us focus on one particular life form. And the consciousness of that one particular biological organism.

Say, for instance, turkeys.

 

[turbo]

Let us be specific when we talk about life. Let us focus on one particular life form. And the consciousness of that one particular biological organism.

Say, for instance, turkeys.

We should perhaps examine the turkey/life thing a bit more. My expectation is that the average turkey will be a lot less likely to experience life in the coming week, but will be a lot more likely to play a role in enhancing the lives of physicists and their families. The physicists may not pay attention well enough to hold up their end of the dead turkey/happy physicist dichotomy, but I'm pretty sure that the turkey population will fully appreciate their contribution before it's over.

 

[Chronos]

It appears the universe exists just fine without observers or opinions to constrain whetever the heck it thinks it is doing.

 

[Garth]

It appears the universe exists just fine without observers or opinions to constrain whetever the heck it thinks it is doing.

But as Stephen Hawking asked, "Why does the universe bother to exist?”
Garth

 

[DaveC426913]

The purpose of life in the universe is very simple.

It's purpose is to provide an observer to cause the infinity of quantum wavefunctions to collapse. If not for an observer, all phenomena will remain in a superposition of states - Schrodinger's Cat will be both dead and alive and plunging into a Sun and floating in vacuum. The whiole universe would be in all possible states without collapsing. Not a dignified state for any self-respecting universe to be in.

 

[turbo]

The purpose of life in the universe is very simple.

It's purpose is to provide an observer to cause the infinity of quantum wavefunctions to collapse. If not for an observer, all phenomena will remain in a superposition of states - Schrodinger's Cat will be both dead and alive and plunging into a Sun and floating in vacuum. The whiole universe would be in all possible states without collapsing. Not a dignified state for any self-respecting universe to be in.

OK, but how did the universe know we would show up? According to standard cosmology, the universe was about a million years old before it was cool enough to allow the first atoms to form. Then we had to have a period of condensation (perhaps 100My), and another period (maybe another 100-200My or so) to allow the formation of the first generation of super-massive stars to provide heavy elements from which life could arise. Then, those materials had to be dispersed and cooled, you get the picture... By the time some rudimentary form of life could have arisen (to play the role of observer), the universe would have had to evolve in an orderly fashion for probably at least a billion years without an observer.

 

[Mike2]

The purpose of life in the universe is very simple.

It's purpose is to provide an observer to cause the infinity of quantum wavefunctions to collapse. If not for an observer, all phenomena will remain in a superposition of states - Schrodinger's Cat will be both dead and alive and plunging into a Sun and floating in vacuum. The whiole universe would be in all possible states without collapsing. Not a dignified state for any self-respecting universe to be in.

Roger Penrose talks about how there must be some sort of Objective Reduction, some principle that collapses the wave function at some level of complexity. He talks about how this might be accomplished by the system becoming entangled with the environment as the mechanism that collapses the wave functions.

I suppose that if there were a conservation of information or entropy principle in the universe, then that might require that the wave function should collapse to one of the alternatives when it becomes entangled with the complex environment of the many particles involved with a measurement process. When reporting the state to the aggregate, the information of the many states of the measurement device (humans, life) become dependent on the state of the system being measured. Information, it seems, is being passed from the system being measured to the system doing the measurement. Information about the system being measured becomes incorporated in the many particles of the measurement device, for otherwise there would be no report to the outside aggregate world. If there were not a loss of information in the system being measured corresponding to the gain of information to the aggregate measuring device, then information would only increase and entropy would not increase with the act of measuring.

I cannot guarantee that this is correct.

 

[Entropy]

Why do we exist? For the enjoyment of existing. That or because atoms are trying to become more stable through chemical reactions.

Try this experiment. Go up to a very high cliff, stand on the edge and jump off. If you hesitate for some reason then for that reason, you exist.

 

[setAI]

I've always thought that the question of why isn't there nothing may have an answer when considering the basis for probability-

the reason why a glowing pink beach ball- or some similar outlandish thing- doesn't just suddenly pop into existence beside your head is becasue the phyiscis of this universe make it HIGHLY improbable- the physics establishes what and where forms are likely to exist and what is impossible or highly unlikely-

however- if there were truly no existence- NoThing- then there would be no space or time or anything like that with physics to establish probablities-

so true NoThingness wouldn't just "remain nothing" [which is absurd to even consider- since there is nothing to remain- and remaining is only something that existing things can do]- instead NoThing may behave like an infinitely berzerk form of the Infinite Improbability Drive in the Hitchihhiker's Guide to The Galaxy - becasue there is no foundational structure which establishes the nature or probability of possible forms/being there would be an infinite eruption of random form/being spontaneously coming into existence- forming a Chaos space of infinite noise- universes would emerge within areas of order forming near the boundaries of attractors in the random noise follwing the dynamics observed in chaotic systems


this would indicate that Nonexistence is impossible- theCosmos had no choice in existing as any nonexistence would immediatly become Chaos- which is Existence- hence the ancient wisdom of NEQUAQUAM VACUUM- Nowhere a void

 

[Garth]

this would indicate that Nonexistence is impossible- theCosmos had no choice in existing as any nonexistence would immediatly become Chaos- which is Existence- hence the ancient wisdom of NEQUAQUAM VACUUM- Nowhere a void

The ancient philosophers applied this to a void within the receptacle of space and time. Are we not here considering the creation of spacetime itself?

Garth

 

[setAI]

The ancient philosophers applied this to a void within the receptacle of space and time. Are we not here considering the creation of spacetime itself?

Garth

Nequaquam vacuum is usually translated as "the Void does not exist" and more accurately described by some scholars as "the Void should not exist" but I suspect that a true meaning would be "the Void cannot exist"

the concept can be routed in the transition of the ancient semitic ideas of Ain [Nothing] to Ain Soph [No Limit]- absolute concepts which establish Being and Action prior to the formation of the Universe- first manifest in the sephiroth of kether [which means "beginning" but does not emerge until "after" the matrix of absolutes Ain/Ain Soph yields Ain Soph Aur [Limitless light] ]

essentially the eruption of infinity [Ain Soph Aur] out of a Nothingness that CANNOT exist results in the Existence of Being/Action where worlds can then form-


seeing as how the universe DOES exist- [if it were an illusion- or virtual- it would still exist as an illusion or a simulation] then the only possibilities are that Nothingness is itself is an absurd error of logic by humankind [which is most likely the case] or Nothing has this lack-of-ability to prevent Existence from erupting into Being- and in a way that is the SAME THING- there are no other possibilities-

 

[Garth]

As Nequaquam vacuum is Latin I was routing its meaning back through the Latin and Greek thinkers, to
1. Aristotle who thought it incoherent (the Void cannot exist), but also to the
2. Stoics who posited a limited universe embedded in the Void and the
3. Epicureans who used it to separate bounded objects within the universe.

The modern versions of these points of view would be –

1. the answer to the question, "What lies beyond the universe?" – Ans. no-thing.
2. the answer to the question, "Where did the Big Bang come from?" – Ans. from a random quantum fluctuation in a primordial “Ylem”.
3. the answer to the question, “What lies between physical objects, such as the space between atoms in the thin plasma of the IGM?” – Ans. Vacuum.

Garth

 

[NeutronStar]

Try this experiment. Go up to a very high cliff, stand on the edge and jump off. If you hesitate for some reason then for that reason, you exist.

I gave some serious thought to your suggested experiment and can't help but laugh at my conclusion. If I went up to a very high cliff and stood on the edge the main reason that I would hesitate to jump off is because I don't like pain!

So I suppose that my reason for existing is that I don't like pain.

Actually I'm not afraid of death at all if I can die painlessly. I wouldn't hesitative to take a nice little lethal injection that would merely end my existence painlessly (at least not for the same reason that I would hesitate to jump off a cliff).

My hesitation for dying painlessly would be more subtle. The reason for my hesitation in that case would probably be because I'm still having fun studying physics and math so I'd rather stick around and have more fun than cease to exist.

So I suppose that my main reason for living is to study physics and math. Pretty sad huh? Actually enjoy petting the dog once in a while too so I suppose that there are other bonuses to life as well.