Philosophy Now Forum

Hello Scott and all,

Here's an intermediate wrap-up, with perhaps a few new ideas derived from nothing or at least much ado about nothing:

The impossibles, such as infinity (largest or smallest), Nothing (‘zero’; no properties), random, absolute solidity (a ‘one’ of infinite density), unfixed will or effects without cause determining them, beginnings and ends to the basis of all, stillness, while seemingly unimportant as nonexistent ‘absolutes’, are the very key to what’s really going on, as those are the boundaries that steer us along a realistic path of reason, since unless both opposites are nonexistent then the impossibility of one indicates that its opposite is true, which is the benefit of philosophy’s logic, even to the great point that a proof is then not even necessary.

So, there is still great hope for the impossible Nothing playing a role for us finding things out, the first of which results in our knowing that there is then something ever, since there is something here, and, further, that even wrongly granting that there could have been a lack of anything then it would still be so.

To gravitate toward Nothing as the Basis because we note the downward progression of the simpler and simple is still an intuition, for what could be simpler than Nothing, but to have to do something we have to further claim that it is unstable and divides into positive and negative, or that any time it tries to be, it can’t, and produces positives and negatives, but, again, these qualities and properties we add onto it make it not a Nothing in the first place.

However, Nothing may have another use, which is that since a ‘zero’ and a ‘one’ cannot be, they don’t exhaust all possibility, as first it might seem, but can’t, since they’re both impossible, but remain as boundaries, granting an in-betweening in which all degrees of ‘fractionals’ must exist, whether actually or just potentially, which state of ‘everything possible’ can also be derived from knowing that What IS ever has no point or place (before or outside of it) that any certain, specific direction can be imparted to it. This is not to say that it might not be subject to a forced default via the necessity of the ultimate simplicity to be a simple, continuous function, but still able, for the first reason above, to not be limited by an impossible First Design.

There is still the tendency to resist ‘cause and effect’ happening forever downward, feeling that the buck has to stop, but then still not anything external could input to it, and so one promotes that cause has to be replaced by something else, an equation perhaps, that of the zero sum, and while all this asks for a proof, without which we seem to have incompleteness (which seems to make it invariably wrong), a proof would be nice to avoid the eternal regress of cause and effect, we are yet again rescued by knowing that something must be ever.

There is, too, a nagging tendency to represent Full Being and Complete Nothingness nevertheless as having to end up as a duality, given that there’s no point to specify either as the Basis, their opposition as impossibles suggesting a necessary blend that is in all respects neither of them.

It then could be, if we can get through the apparent paradox, that there must be or close to a zero-sum balance across existence that cancels out at totality, in principle, yet it can’t, really, but for the enduring realness of the actuality of the possibility giving rise to the mechanism for the scheme, which would then be the Ultimate Something.

Thus the interactions of nature would be of total precision, to always sum to zero, with no energy adding up for free out of nowhere, this necessity granting the conservation laws.

So, what are all these opposites, some of them canceling somewhat, or even zero-sum balances, that we’ve found?

— Overall electric neutrality, of positive and negative charge, this opposite polarity of charge seeming to nullify all of existence in the overview, but not in actuality, for nothing cannot be.

Note that if there is space, then its dimensions are additive, summative, and so they can’t perform the nullification, leaving the fourth, time, which must then do it, yet timely goes forward, but disregarding and/or overturning that, then time is somehow related to charge, which is difficult to fathom.
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— The Baryon number is zero, of matter and anti-matter. We’re back to Question #16.

— The weak force (changeability) opposes the strong force (stability).

There are all kind of oppositional pairs, such as up/down, on/off, etc., and also transitional pairs, such as the electric transforming into magnetic and back, and so forth, which is what an electromagnetic wave does to keep on going, past to now to future.

— The positive kinetic energy of stuff is canceled by the negative potential energy of gravity (Hawking). Energy must be expended to pull two things apart.


So, between the only two option of ‘something forever’ versus ‘something from Nothing’, we still hold the ToE in hand, as one of these two options, and that isn’t too shabby, pulse still end up with a something, and we have such.

We can even again attempt try to unify the two options, as in that ‘something forever’, having no beginning, didn’t come from anywhere, this “not from anywhere” seeming to be like the other option, ‘something from Nothing’, but that’s not quite the same, or as ‘something from Nothing’ is the forever basis, thus making it appear to be the ‘something forever’, but Nothing must be unproductive or else ‘it’ isn’t a Nothing.

PoeticUniverse wrote:Scott, your analysis pertains to the human realm of finding out about a container but doesn't result in Nothing being real ontologically, but that Nothing, like infinity, is that which can't be reached, along with full solidity and nowhere to put something. Thus, the forced default of there having to be something ever.

I've proven it above. I'm not sure what you are not following. The initial container I used is represented in reality as totality itself, if we could get a box big enough to contain it. Whether this 'box' can be defined infinitely larger, it is the content of it to which I'm pointing out that is variable with at least a something AND a nothing. These are real.

May I suggest The Great Math Mystery, a PBS program that helps explain how the apparent abstraction of things like this are very real. I've mentioned before that if we use logic or math as tools, we are only assured that these have value if they themselves are real when used elsewhere to interpret other things we deem real. If we don't accept this, then we are not privileged to speak of any reality without simply begging it.

If you fasten two boards together using a hammer, you require the reality of the hammer too, not just what it can demonstrably create.
If you use math/logic to measure what is real, you require the reality of the math/logic too, not just what it can demonstrably present.

What I'm noticing from many here is that you are like one who moves into a house to which you presume as real. But then should you try to imagine how it is built, because the tools are no longer there, you assume that they could not have existed! Even should such tools used to build the house could be relatively indeterminate and even destroyed with the impossibility of ever knowing, you can still infer that REAL tools were used. To think otherwise, you act defiantly local as you interpret only your direct observation of the house is what matters.

Scott Mayers wrote: I've proven it above. I'm not sure what you are not following. The initial container I used is represented in reality as totality itself, if we could get a box big enough to contain it. Whether this 'box' can be defined infinitely larger, it is the content of it to which I'm pointing out that is variable with at least a something AND a nothing. These are real.

You know I'm going to say that Totality, which you already have as existing, can't have a box put around it since Totality is all there is and can't have an outside (or a 'before'), plus while to box an existing thing might make for a nice present to be given from one god to another, the existent Totality is in the box as it is, not nothing.

Scott Mayers wrote:May I suggest The Great Math Mystery, a PBS program that helps explain how the apparent abstraction of things like this are very real. I've mentioned before that if we use logic or math as tools, we are only assured that these have value if they themselves are real when used elsewhere to interpret other things we deem real. If we don't accept this, then we are not privileged to speak of any reality without simply begging it.

Sure, I'll take a look.

Scott Mayers wrote:What I'm noticing from many here is that you are like one who moves into a house to which you presume as real. But then should you try to imagine how it is built, because the tools are no longer there, you assume that they could not have existed! Even should such tools used to build the house could be relatively indeterminate and even destroyed with the impossibility of ever knowing, you can still infer that REAL tools were used. To think otherwise, you act defiantly local as you interpret only your direct observation of the house is what matters.

True, that some are often more focused on the result as the message rather than the messenger of the implementation, but not usually for philosophers, scientists, poets, and ToE researchers, but, yes, all composite things must have been made by life's or nature's ways, "tooled", and especially, for a house, with tools like saws and hammers.

Philosophy Explorer wrote:Leo said:

"Empty space has no physical properties and thus cannot be said to physically exist." Depends on what you mean by empty space. Mainstream physics says (empty) space has many properties and you still need the empty space, otherwise where do those properties exist?

PhilX

In case you hadn't noticed, Phil, this is not a physics forum. This is a philosophy forum where statements are required to make sense. Please define these properties and explain what they can do.

Philosophy Explorer wrote:Light can’t be slowed down by gravity,

Absolute fucking crap and easily proven as such. This is all about the observer problem once again, as all the stupid crap in physics always is. The speed of light is always measured as a constant in the referential frame of the observer. In other words if you measure the speed of light ANYWHERE IN THE UNIVERSE it will be always be measured at 300 million m/sec, AS MEASURED LOCALLY. Therefore it is the most inconstant speed in the entire universe because a second is the most inconstant time interval in the entire universe, being variable all the way down to the Planck scale. The speed of light is different at your head than it is at your feet and this is something you should be grateful for because it is this fact which is holding you onto the surface of the earth.

Scott Mayers wrote:If you fasten two boards together using a hammer, you require the reality of the hammer too, not just what it can demonstrably create.
If you use math/logic to measure what is real, you require the reality of the math/logic too, not just what it can demonstrably present.

This cuts both ways. it is mathematically possible to cut a 2 metre plank of wood into two 1 metre planks. However it is physically impossible, even in principle. It is mathematically possible to take three apples out of a fruitbowl containing two apples. Need I go on?

PoeticUniverse wrote:a proof would be nice to avoid the eternal regress of cause and effect, we are yet again rescued by knowing that something must be ever.

Conceptually discomforting though this may be to a mortal mind this statement must be accepted as a self-evident truth. Because existence exists at all it must exist eternally. Ex nihilo, nihil fit is one of the most ancient truths in metaphysics and absolutely NOBODY has ever managed to lay a glove on it.

You have set yourself an ambitious task, Scott, but my guess is that a few equations and some clever argument is unlikely to overturn the wisdom of the ancients. Does your theory yield a testable prediction which would falsify the mainstream view?

PoeticUniverse wrote:

Scott Mayers wrote: I've proven it above. I'm not sure what you are not following. The initial container I used is represented in reality as totality itself, if we could get a box big enough to contain it. Whether this 'box' can be defined infinitely larger, it is the content of it to which I'm pointing out that is variable with at least a something AND a nothing. These are real.

You know I'm going to say that Totality, which you already have as existing, can't have a box put around it since Totality is all there is and can't have an outside (or a 'before'), plus while to box an existing thing might make for a nice present to be given from one god to another, the existent Totality is in the box as it is, not nothing.

I described this Totality by representing as a 'fixed' idea as a box. But I also recognize that things like time act as just another 'static' measure to which we experience dynamically. As such, Totality too can be infinite. But when we try to make sense of it, we begin by limiting it to any size, always recognizing that a greater size (outside) exists too. But if you interpret this infinitely, then the outside is the nothingness to where what becomes real comes from too.

You can also define this 'box' as one that grows at the rate of what comes into being. In this way, then the box can contain everything relative to the box as a whole. The contents of it is that which would be perceived as dividing rather than multiplying when you have an outside as well. It doesn't matter though. However way you interpret Totality, it acts acts as a box which contains what we deem real. If Totality doesn't contain what is also nothingness, then it requires that nothingness is outside and yet what Totality dynamically 'borrows' from. If Totality contains nothingness as well as somethingness, it borrows from what it is as a whole by dividing from it infinitely. Both perspectives are equally valid and so whether you interpret this as all from one or all from nothing, they mean the same thing. Thus nothing and something are at least both required for Totality.

I defer to a nothingness if even to recognize that my own consciousness derived from it alone. This also makes my interpretation an empirical observation through indirect reference to what is available to me to determine me aging from some origin.

PoeticUniverse wrote:

Scott Mayers wrote:What I'm noticing from many here is that you are like one who moves into a house to which you presume as real. But then should you try to imagine how it is built, because the tools are no longer there, you assume that they could not have existed! Even should such tools used to build the house could be relatively indeterminate and even destroyed with the impossibility of ever knowing, you can still infer that REAL tools were used. To think otherwise, you act defiantly local as you interpret only your direct observation of the house is what matters.

True, that some are often more focused on the result as the message rather than the messenger of the implementation, but not usually for philosophers, scientists, poets, and ToE researchers, but, yes, all composite things must have been made by life's or nature's ways, "tooled", and especially, for a house, with tools like saws and hammers.

You still don't recognize that only unless you are aware of the physical tools, like hammers, they are indeterminate if all you knew was a house. Pretend, for instance that you never seen those tools. You can still model what you can guess is the tools. But even being particularly uncertain of whether your particular idea of the tool is real, you know that there IS such.

But now add that you learn of these tools. Those tools now are real to you but you may question the nature of the material that makes them up. This too leads to an infinite regress that approaches nothingness itself. Math describes all of these. And while you can describe things like matter within space, you cannot do so without recognizing the space as a backdrop reality to distinguish what is or is not matter.

I also begin with nothingness as a model too that aids better to provide justice to what I use within a logic incorporating contradiction as a motivating function of reality. This way you can use such a law to derive what follows in a consistent way to discover what is true with completion. AND it works. Thus, my theory is able to both be practical and act to make sense of everything with better closure.

Ignore whether you agree or not to which perspective you begin with. I opted to use nothingness as it is functional to understand my theory. This is all that should matter. Bogging me down to try to justify this initial premise as real or not sufficiently for you only prevents you or others from following my arguments later. If you don't like this initial premise, then just pretend it for the sake of my argument. Then I can move on with the proofs based on that. At least, it is the only thing I assume which makes it easier to understand what follows.

Obvious Leo wrote:

Scott Mayers wrote:If you fasten two boards together using a hammer, you require the reality of the hammer too, not just what it can demonstrably create.
If you use math/logic to measure what is real, you require the reality of the math/logic too, not just what it can demonstrably present.

This cuts both ways. it is mathematically possible to cut a 2 metre plank of wood into two 1 metre planks. However it is physically impossible, even in principle. It is mathematically possible to take three apples out of a fruitbowl containing two apples. Need I go on?

I don't follow your rationale here at all. To determine a nothing given a something requires reducing what is given to a nothing. Therefore you have to argue how you begin with say, two apples, and reduce it to the one. Then you divide this apple infinitely and come up with nothingness.

Obvious Leo wrote:

PoeticUniverse wrote:a proof would be nice to avoid the eternal regress of cause and effect, we are yet again rescued by knowing that something must be ever.

Conceptually discomforting though this may be to a mortal mind this statement must be accepted as a self-evident truth. Because existence exists at all it must exist eternally. Ex nihilo, nihil fit is one of the most ancient truths in metaphysics and absolutely NOBODY has ever managed to lay a glove on it.

You have set yourself an ambitious task, Scott, but my guess is that a few equations and some clever argument is unlikely to overturn the wisdom of the ancients. Does your theory yield a testable prediction which would falsify the mainstream view?

If I cannot convince you, then do what I suggest above: Just assume nothingness. I clearly argued above that both a somethingness must exist AND a nothingness. For my theory, just assume the 'something' portion, Totality itself as true. Then my further assumption of nothingness, while you or others may not agree to whether it exists or not, just pretend it for the sake of later arguments. Then, you'll be able to actually see how my theory of everything else follows to which predicts everything else. But don't expect me to believe my own use of nothingness is something I doubt while you have the prerogative to do so. Then I can move on with presenting my theory. But I'll do it in the thread I opened for that: My Theory

Scott Mayers wrote: And while you can describe things like matter within space, you cannot do so without recognizing the space as a backdrop reality to distinguish what is or is not matter.

This is Aristotle's space, Scott, as well as Newton's, in which case you'll have to get rid of spacetime forthwith because this is not Einstein's space. In the 4D manifold the moon only exists if somebody is watching it, according to Einstein, and the poor fucking cat can be simultaneously dead and alive indefinitely. Are you claiming that these are physically true statements or are you willing to accept that they are mathematical metaphors as the inventors of these models claimed all along. Schrodinger's story is a piss-take at his own expense from back in the day when physicists didn't take themselves so bloody literally and Einstein was doing nothing more than pointing out the same flaw in his own model. These ridiculous conclusions from QM were CREATED by the spatialising of time in SR and if you can't see that then it means you haven't understood the SR model. Furthermore SR is comprehensively disproven by GR and if you can't see that then you haven't understood the GR model. QM, SR and GR all completely contradict each other and yet you're attempting to defend them. Why would you try to do such a foolish thing when every physicist in the business for the past half century has been trying to get rid of these obsolete stories and replace them with a new one?

Do you seriously think that you can do what a century of the smartest minds in science has failed to do, namely to put lipstick on a pig? FORTY BLOODY YEARS the string theorists wasted with their ridiculous curled up dimensions and their infinite number of universes and for what? So Ptolemy can keep smirking at them with his shit-eating grin because it was he that set the pattern for this way of doing business.

Scott Mayers wrote: If Totality doesn't contain what is also nothingness, then it requires that nothingness is outside and yet what Totality dynamically 'borrows' from. If Totality contains nothingness as well as somethingness, it borrows from what it is as a whole by dividing from it infinitely. Both perspectives are equally valid and so whether you interpret this as all from one or all from nothing, they mean the same thing. Thus nothing and something are at least both required for Totality.

This prospect or not of a none outside of a one reminds me of my friend, who called himself Nobody Nowhere, who began a thread with how there cannot be a none outside of a one when someone asked him what was outside the All (sometimes also called the Cosmos, Totality, or even the universe). He had it that 'Nothing' somehow differentness itself, although we know that that action qualifies as a something.

We may be able to get something out of it. Here are my notes from that encounter (I may have influenced or slightly amended some of it; also, the first line of each grouping is the title ):

(These are not poems, but formatted that way to help the thoughts therein become more precise and concise.)

Absolute vs. Relative
A None isn’t ‘there’ nor shows up here,
So, a One can’t be, either, with None outside;
Thus there is no absolute One or None,
Which forces the relative ‘in-between’.

‘One’ as an Absolute Fails Even More
So, we can’t step into what isn’t there,
Nor can a One expand into None,
Nor can there be spaces of None
Within the arena of a One.

Relativism
Absolute time, space, and motion
Are impossible, which forces relative frames—
Of fractional relations of
Near endless variations of quanta.

The Oddness of Light Photons
Light is ‘null’ to time—not a part of it,
Nor is light of space—it makes space-time ‘lit’.
On a light beam there’s no extent or time!
Light seems to have neither reason nor rhyme.

Already There
Light’s full speed in a true vacuum
Of no time and no space is as ‘infinite’,
For it is already everywhere;
In other words: everywhere in no time.

The Zero-Point Extended
This point of creation-annihilation
Is extended into a faux reality,
Both by finite consciousness and by
Light slowed by virtual particles pairs.

Light/Matter
Light photons colliding make for
Electrons and positrons, and vice-versa,
With the forward-time of photons being
Canceled by the backward-time gravitons.

Phantasmal Being
Each ‘now’ that’s created and recreated
Over the various relative quanta
Has really already happened, coming, going,
And never ever returning, gone in a flash.

Once Upon a ‘Time’
Of course, it did all really happen ‘once’,
As in all-at-once, in the timeless realm
That must be the state of the ‘eternal’ IS,
With IS being close to what’s called the ‘Wiz’

Nether-Nor
So, neither absolute solidity
Nor absolute vacuity can be,
Leaving relativism as a necessity,
For we do have sensory experience.

The Play
Our ‘reality’ is as a flip-book’s pages turning,
The still pictures changing a bit, granting
An apparent motion, such as in a movie;
However, we do get to experience it!

Come and Gone
Like the light from a star already spent,
Our ‘get up and go’ has long gone and went.
We all birthed, lived, and died right away;
There’s nothing left but the slo-mo replay.

Being Nothingness
Our parentheses in eternity
Flashes as a twinkling, but’s extended
By ‘time’ into a phantasmic life dream
That’s existent the same as if it were.

In the Eye of the Beholder
A life dream’s like a rainbow, not really there,
A false phenomenon become tangible
Through relativism, this faux true,
Molding temporary significance.

Arbitrary
Life’s indeterminate and not, the same
Being brought by the virtual as the true,
The mechanics being as incidental
As why ‘color’ chose its wave frequencies.

The Mechanics of Reality
The result, being the message, is undeniable,
But herein we speak of the messenger,
Which is the implementation,
As that of a recording, over a live band.

The Balance of Opposites
Life’s here, as like virtual particles
Born this side of an event horizon
Of a Black Hole, real-eyes(ed) by their presence
In the realm of what’s been radiated.

What Makes No Difference is No Difference
There is no difference in what makes none;
‘Relativism’ is now playing, the living film—
A reality show in the inner theater
Of the mind’s eye, with the ‘I’ observing.

Existence Has No Opposite
‘Possibility’ is what’s fundamental,
For all that can be must first be possible.
This ‘Potential’ for All is the default,
Since a NOT can’t be, or even be meant.

The Math
0/0 = n (all variations), since any n times 0 = 0,
So, 0/0 is as nonexistence divided by itself
Into all of the various relative states;
No absolutes, so there’s only the temporary.

More Math
Zero is the greatest number, for it represents
The sum of negative and positive infinities.
Note that an actual infinity cannot be,
For it cannot be capped, and thus has no being.

Lighting the Way
Our finite speed of light, ‘c’, is such
Because it is slowed by virtual particles,
But, even so, to ride it makes time instant,
With all space shrinking to a point.

The Cosmic Egg
The cosmos is as a giant neutron or photon,
The crests and troughs waving, in a
Relative existence, between Zero and One,
Unable to reach either, jiggling-rippling.

Not Unbreakable, Not Unmakeable
The necessity of no One and no None
Makes for no absolutes, which means
That time, space, matter, and motion
Have no intrinsic, indivisible qualities.

The First Cause
Thus, our ‘reality’ is only apparent,
Yet this effect happens always, everywhere,
For the causeless-defaulted ‘cause’ of this
Potential-Possibility must always be such.

Total Solidity and Complete Vacuity Can’t Be
The One and the None cannot mix;
Then there would be two opposite absolutes;
Plus, what is solid could not move,
So, neither can cut it; relativism rules.

The Shimmering Gleam
We butterflies, on the edge of forever’s flight,
Spread fast our wings on the ocean of light
That is of the ageless photonic opposing waves
In no time, mass, or space that is thereby made.

Here and Now Only
We are as beings of the everlasting light dream,
As products time and time again by its means,
Of the eternal return, as baubles blown and burst,
Though frames of time that quench life’s thirst.

Nowhere Man/Woman
Time future, time present, and time past
Are all at once, with not a bit of it to last.
The glorious light flashes us into being shone,
As the light ‘eternal’ of all time to be known.

The Age-Old Question
Why is there something rather than nothing?
Well, the question is now moot, for there’s neither
An absolute something (it’s relative)
Nor an absolute nothing. Neither can be.

Nothing Outside
What is that which is outside the universe?
There can be no absolute universe
With an absolute nothingness
Outside, so the question’s become moot.

In No Time and No Space
What came first, the matter or the light,
Since it seems that each needs the other to be?
There’s no first, only at the same ‘time’.
Photons, electrons, positrons are all-at-once.

Relativism, Ever In-between
Why is the relative universe
So incredibly ‘infinitely’ large?
Because the small has to be so
Incredibly infinitesimal, as the simple.

Instantaneous
Where did relative existence some from?
There is nothing to make it of, but it had to be,
Since it is here, so it all cancels out,
Instantly; it’s simultaneous.

The Default Condition
Who or what made our relative existence?
No one and no-thing, for it is
Of the simple brute force of all scenarios—
As relatively existing between Zero and One.

No Such Thing
How could some absolute existents
Be indivisible-unbreakable, and unmakeable?
There aren’t any, so the problem is moot.
‘Nothing lasts’—it’s the “nonexistent absolute”.

One of the Better Universes
The flowing through all paths of everything
Guarantees that the best solutions will be found,
Which beats Intelligence that tries to foresee all,
But never can; nor can the complex be First.

Being
Did the universe have a beginning?
No, because the universe cannot be
Affected by anything outside it.
It just is, and, beyond’, it also isn’t.

Why Not Any Certain Way?
If the relative universe is eternal,
Then what is there to explain the way it is?
It is ‘universes’ in every way,
And so not any universe in particular.

No Linear Movement Through Space
Does a whole new universe appear at every ‘now’?
Yes, one doesn’t step into the same universe twice,
This somewhat analogous to someone clever,
Who said, that we never step into the same river.

Greatness
What is the source of all this existence,
For that still seems to make it great?
Unconsciousness, nothing, no-mind is
The be-all, start-all, and end-all, as ‘great’.

Nature’s Mistake?
Should we then let go of all our ego?
Not necessarily, for the ego is
An input to our resultant zest for life;
However, take it all in with a grain of salt.

Step Back
Yes, detach from it all when necessary.
It is as a play within no play,
In no place in no time, just relative.
The timeless-formless is as ‘nothingness’.

Still Asking
What is the meaning in all that?
Only what we have and enjoy
In the here and now, internally.
Externally, there isn’t anything.

No Real Reality
Forget about indivisible fundamental substance;
It would be unbreakable and thus unmakable.
For the ‘null’, look to the unconscious,
‘Finite’ to consciousness, ‘method’ to the subconscious.

It is Just to Be
What is the purpose of our existence?
None, but we do ‘exist’ in one of the
Relative scenarios whose path led to us.
Our existence was inherent, all along.

The Gateway to Perfection
Enjoy the play that you get to act in,
Sometimes retreating to the back row,
As the distanced audience, witnessing afar,
Finding peace and everlasting gladness.

Scott Mayers wrote:But now add that you learn of these tools. Those tools now are real to you but you may question the nature of the material that makes them up. This too leads to an infinite regress that approaches nothingness itself. Math describes all of these. And while you can describe things like matter within space, you cannot do so without recognizing the space as a backdrop reality to distinguish what is or is not matter.

Well, at least we know our minds operate as if the 'what' was in a 'where'. Also, note that one cannot divide something quantized indefinitely.

Scott Mayers wrote:If you don't like this initial premise, then just pretend it for the sake of my argument. Then I can move on with the proofs based on that. At least, it is the only thing I assume which makes it easier to understand what follows.

OK, I'll look for the continuation in your thread.

17. Can the Fundamental make itself?

No, for it wouldn’t have existence before making itself, nor can it if it's existent already; so, it must be ever existing. No self-made person or Person.

18. Is the wave function probability real or just a math tool?

In New Scientist, a year or two ago, an article said the wave function probability is real, not just a mathematical probability tool. They found that quantum mechanics would not work if the wave function was not real.
What would this imply?

Let us revisit again whether our universe’s Alpha start in time is so improbable as it seems, as in question #16, what with its severe grouping order of separated matter and antimatter, such as that of the separated white and black pieces at the beginning of a chess game, with ideas from Gavin Giorbran.

Such an arrangement seems a rarity, but it may rather be that time cannot go forward if there is no progression from this very distinct grouping order of the Alpha Start toward the proposed Omega End of a totally blended symmetry order, this idea similar to an end as disorder of high entropy from any start of low entropy.

The universe is now in its its diversity stage, both at large and in our own aisle, yet its future of a blended symmetry order ever pulls/guides the present along, such as in the “time is like a river” analogy, this ‘flow’ proceeding inexorably from Lake Alpha to Lake Omega.

How and why was the seemingly rare state of the high ordered Alpha beginning of our universe accomplished?
The IS, as great as it is, is still subject to two boundaries, as the start and end described above.

All the probabilities of all imbalances must trace back to the one and only state of the most probable beginning of all,
Totality is in a superposition, all at once—of no time and of no space, the quantum probability patterns really being so, not just a math tool.

The separation of matter and anti-matter as the greatest possible imbalance, while all the probability balances must trace forward to the greatest and most probable imbalance at the end of all.

The ultimate, flat, symmetry order of the Omega—the end of all, draws the river of time along, guiding it, through the probability patterns.

The Time River of Probabilities flows smoother and further near its center, while near the shores there are eddies and swirls, contrasts, lumpiness, ebbs—even back flow.

The nows proceed and the moments play, motion but apparent, as successive frames—all the alternate plot’s scenarios being, which will blend at the Omega.

Our two brain hemispheres, too, must reflect the nature of the universe itself, as the left-side grouping order versus and with the whole of the right-side symmetry order.

Top-down drives the bottom-up ‘events’, the future ever affecting the present; The flat whiteness of the Omega End brings forth the diversified prismatic colors.

Electrons, protons, seem ‘bottom-up’, but are ‘enfolded’ in the top-down whole, as with Bohm’s implicit order guiding the blooming, unfolding, explicit order.

There are still many more ways for the universe to be lumpy, in degrees, than for it to be perfectly smooth, and that’s why there’s still a grouping order, as with galaxies and solar systems.

The not other no longer ‘improbable’ symmetry of uniformity comes at future’s end; This Omega symmetry order is the opposite of Alpha’s grouping order.

The fundamental reality then is en-un-foldment; particles are abstractions from that. Electrons don’t exist continuously but are coming, going, then coming again.

Probabilities are actualities, so probabilities exist, so then we have a simple solution to why our universe came from a dense state.

All the possible patterns of the past and future exist simultaneously, independent of the passage of time frames, so, the history of a temporal universe moving through those possible patterns will inevitably trace backward to the extreme, greatest imbalance, and hence to the severe order of the Alpha start.

It seems strange that time began from Alpha, unless patterns are physically real, so then time invariably originates from the greatest imbalance of them all.

Time’s forward direction is ever toward balance. and so when it’s traced backward, that same path invariably originates from imbalance; the temporal universe is as it must be.

Since pattern space is existingly there then the flow of time is built into reality, causing probable time-worlds to exist, while extremely improbable time-worlds do not.

The must-existence of patterns is great—for the hierarchy of atomic elements, star systems, bio-life, consciousness, and finally intelligence and wisdom.

If time and change were not restricted to probability’s arrow of time built into pattern space then anything could happen and would happen, as chaos.

The end promotes the means in that time’s river, having a specific ending, explains why the universe’s wave function is specific. If what’s possible was just coming from the past, There’s no reasonable explanation for the control of all the probabilities, such as the wave density of atomic particles, A river only from the past would be flowing outward into chaos, but it can’t.

The low entropy assumption of the big bang is a consequence of the spacetime theory only, PU, and it is an assumption which stands in stark contradiction of the evidence. It is far more logical to assume a high entropy big bang as well as being perfectly consistent with 13.8 billion years worth of evidence. Our universe is evolving from the simple to the complex and NOT the other way around.

19. Is math the basis of All?

Pi shows up everywhere; the planets’ orbits are ellipses; the atomic elements have a numbered arrangement; the Fibonacci sequence shows up in the spirals of a sunflower; physics formulas work; positive and negative balances appear in Nature and nature, etc.

If math is Reality, then particles, forces, and energy are not just described by equations but are the equations.

I rather, though, think that numbers and their subsequent mathematics were invented by humans in order to, at first, have shorthand labels for the number of objects

Math indeed turns out to be suitable for things in nature that exhibit rhythm and regularity and thus make themselves amenable to being described by math equations, although we often have to improve later on to get more accuracy.

More than the above, though, but not math as fundamental, is that the machinery of the universe and of the biological must churn out very math related outputs, such as that stars are machines that produce the atomic elements, nature’s bio-machine produces the sunflower patterns, brains’ neural networks have cells that fire when a certain threshold of inputs is reached, and pi is going to show up a lot (it being central to circular goings on).

Now, if only we could solve the three-body problem straight out instead using probability math.

(And, of course, there is Leo's computer-like Turing machine of "logic-gates".)

PoeticUniverse wrote: Now, if only we could solve the three-body problem straight out instead using probability math.

It can't be done, PU, although fractal geometry will yield very close approximations. In the case of the entire universe the 3 body problem becomes the n-body problem where n=every single matter particle in existence. Curiously this is something that even Newton knew but has long since been forgotten and/or ignored. (Except by Poincare). The motion of every single matter particle in the universe is causally related to the motion of every other. Newton assumed that this causal relationship was instantaneous action at a distance which was rather stupid of him because even in his day it was well known that the speed of light was finite. We now all know perfectly well that the speed of light is finite and yet the significance of this is obscured in the Minkowski block because it ignores gravity altogether by spatialising time. The truth of the n-body problem is that the speed of light and the speed of time are one and the same thing and both are determined by the cosmic metronome of gravity. This is quantum gravity.

Physics is still unable to explain why the apple falls from the tree but the philosophy of the bloody obvious can.

The apple falls from the tree to the ground because time passes more quickly at tree-level than it does at ground-level. It accelerates all the way down because this relativistic relationship is inversely logarithmic in its nature. This is not a controversial statement and by no means is this bleeding edge physics. This is an indisputable fact which no physicist will deny but it does take some heavy-duty thinking to realise the full implications of this. This is a totally different way of thinking the world from that which Newton bequeathed to science but it is by no means original.

You know this bloody well, Austin, because this is the world of Omar's Rubaiyat.