Philosophy Now Forum

Notvacka wrote:You have to remember that metaphysics (literally beyond physics) is pure speculation and never meant to replace physics the way Godfree is trying to do. Qualified physicists engage in metaphysical speculation too. (The many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics is a prime example.)

I'm more interested in Cerveny's line of reasoning, since he at least seems to understand the actual physics.

If you read what I write then you'd notice that I call the metaphysicians who left philosophy to its idle speculations for the rigors of a stricter epistemology, the Newtonians.

What still joins us however is Formal Logics, hence the Modal Logics of the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.

Notvacka wrote:

Cerveny wrote:

Notvacka wrote:....The words "prepared" and "waiting" are not entirely accurate, since they imply one further dimension of temporality, but yes, that's exactly what I believe. The notion that the future doesn't exist, just because we haven't experienced it yet, seems much harder to believe. That the future would exist in some vague, unformed way seems even more ridiculous. Every point in time must be as valid as any other. What is "past" and what is "future" is entirely a matter of perspective. No particular moment of "now" is more "real" than the next....

You can replace the word "prepared" and "waiting" by the word "determined" or "given".
"Determined Universe" (Einstein's world) means that every motion, every decay of every elementary particle, every intention of every man are (already) given (fixed) in advance for ever.
Such Universe needs unlimited "memory", by the way - let us say then, unlimited "space-time".
I have two very big problems with it (at least):
- How such unlimited information can appear in the whole complexity in one moment?

"Already", "in advance", "in one moment" are no better than "prepared" and "waiting". Your words still imply one further dimension of temporality: The "memory" you speak of is the universe itself. All possible "information" about the universe is stored in the universe. In fact, you might say that the information is the universe. It does not "appear" in one moment. The whole of it just is. We experience a temporal slice of existence called "now". Our moment of "now" changes while the universe remains the same.

Well then, I am to lead the discussion by another way. We need to clear the terminology:
- Is the Einstein’s “space-time” a real entity (as for example an electron is) or it is only some abstract math tool, useful for “special” formalism?
(In case: “space-time” is real then
- Is there any difference between the vacuum and physical (empty) space?
- Is the physical space a subset of Einstein’s “space-time”?
- Is the “time axis” of “space-time” unlimited?
- Are you “placed” in particular part of “space-time” in particular moment?
End)

Cerveny wrote:

Notvacka wrote:....- What is the sense of such Universe (why such Universe exists)?

Now, there is a question you might ask God, if you believe in God. Why does anything at all exist? What kind of universe would have a reason to exist? I don't think a determined universe makes less "sense" than an undetermined one.

Determined Universe seems to be … useless, worthless… vain from global point of view
Undetermined Universe is … productive, seeking … it has an aim; it is somehow useful - as the physical nature is.

Cerveny wrote:... Determined Universe seems to be … useless, worthless… vain from global point of view
Undetermined Universe is … productive, seeking … it has an aim; it is somehow useful - as the physical nature is.

But your model of crystallization in a phase-space boundary is pretty determinate?

Cerveny wrote:- Is the Einstein’s “space-time” a real entity (as for example an electron is) or it is only some abstract math tool, useful for “special” formalism?

This question is perhaps not as clear-cut as it might seem. The three dimensions of space are real enough. It's the space we live in. The dimension of time is real too. We live through time. Einstein's theory binds time and space together in a way that beautifully explains a lot of natural phenomena. Since the theory works, space and time must be related in a "real" way. Viewing time as another spatial dimension is the most obvious way to picture this relation, but since time differs from space in how we experience it, there might be more to it than such a picture can convey. My answer would still be yes; space-time is a real entity, though perhaps not as we picture it.

Cerveny wrote:(In case: “space-time” is real then
- Is there any difference between the vacuum and physical (empty) space?

I'm not sure what you mean by "the vacuum" as opposed to empty space, so no, I don't think there would be any difference.

Cerveny wrote:- Is the physical space a subset of Einstein’s “space-time”?

I think so.

Cerveny wrote:- Is the “time axis” of “space-time” unlimited?

As a theoretical construction, the axis is unlimited. Whether time itself is unlimited depends on the geometry of space-time.

Cerveny wrote:- Are you “placed” in particular part of “space-time” in particular moment?

This seems like a strange question to ask. In space-time your physical body can be pictured as a four-dimensional wormlike shape reaching from the point of your birth onward through time, resting in place. However, a human life is experienced sequentially through time. What causes this appearent movement is not explained by relativity or by any other physical theory. That our movement through time is a purely mental construction doesn't seem like a wholly satisfactory answer either, so there is room for further speculation here. We simply don't understand what time is.

Cerveny wrote:Determined Universe seems to be … useless, worthless… vain from global point of view. Undetermined Universe is … productive, seeking … it has an aim; it is somehow useful - as the physical nature is.

I don't see how this goes beyond emotion, and my emotions about it are not the same as yours. Of course, the notion that the universe should be useful and have sense or aim is near religious. Nothing wrong with that, though. A book is determined once written, but it still has sense and aim while read.

Arising_uk wrote:

Cerveny wrote:... Determined Universe seems to be … useless, worthless… vain from global point of view
Undetermined Universe is … productive, seeking … it has an aim; it is somehow useful - as the physical nature is.

But your model of crystallization in a phase-space boundary is pretty determinate?

No, every "crystal" (physical space - in our case) is unique, full of some kinds of defects (elementary particles - in our case). Just the screw dislocations can raise some analogy to spin of elementary particles - for example. But the problem is 4-D structure that has not been explored in context of structure defects yet :( Please note our real 3-D Universe is a surface of some 4-D growing (crystallizing) structure :)
Perhaps can be useful next links: http://www.minsocam.org/msa/collectors_ ... rewdis.htm http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9W2b_5Lk ... re=related fo example...

John wrote:

Godfree wrote:Obviously I'm putting too much into each post,
and you get the point lost before you finish reading

You're not. It just amuses me that you think your points are either new or old ones that astrophysicists are ignoring or unable to answer.

You've still not responded to the academic paper I posted which just looks like more avoidance of experts who can show you where you are wrong.

Pose your question to Stephen Hawking and if it stumps him I'll take some interest.

I'm sure Stephen nows Michele Cappellari , from Oxford University , physics department , who has made some of these claims ,the data gathered by this team includes ,Japanese Subaru telescope,Hubble ultra deep field ,
infared ESO's VLT , very large telescope,
an infared array camera onboard Nasa'a Spitzer telescope ,
and images from Spitzer Space Telescope,
They quote people including EJ Lerner , ie thebigbangneverhappened ,
and they make it quite plain and easy to see the big bang cannot be real ,
structures observed in space that would take up to 100 billion years to,
form in a bb expanding universe model,
I will now go and find your page ,
have you found the page with all these references yet ,???

John , I checked out the page on general relativistic expansion model ,
to me it's just theories on theories , they came up with the bb theory ,
and now we have lots of theories as to how the bb could be real ,
when it appears to contradict the observational evidence ,
The people doing this stuff , EJ Lerner , Michele Cappellari ,
could say with confidence the universe must be older than we think ,
back before we got the latest images to further prove it ,
just 10 billion light years is far enough , if what your looking at is old and dead,
because we would have to ad more than 10 billion years more ,
to the age making the universe at least 20 billion years old,
Hubble ultra deep field has found 10,000 fully formed galaxies ,
13 billion light years away , I get the feeling ,
you just don't believe it ,,!!!

Cerveny wrote:... But the problem is 4-D structure that has not been explored in context of structure defects yet Please note our real 3-D Universe is a surface of some 4-D growing (crystallizing) structure ...

Not sure you can say "is" here.

I think I understand your analogy but is it not a problem that there appears to be no way we could explore such a 4-d structure?

For myself, in my madder moments, I think you could described the process more as the initialization or boot-up or even the running process of a 3-D holographic plank-bit cellular automata, with the 3-D being in some fourth dimension to us. That is, we're in a sim on a 'god' machine of some kind.

As to Cerveny's Einstein "determined universe already and forever" and I add "god does not play dice" -

If we take into account also the quantum notions where each individual consciousness Is "the center" of the universe, it would seem to make the questions of past, present and future and choice fairly obvious:

Consciousness "makes sense" of the universe. That's all it does. It interprets as a function of itself the experience it is already having, the 'data' that is already in place to interpret, to make sense.

As Sartre, choice is the projection of the 'past' as the 'future' in the 'present'.
The problem is not so much this apparent truth of the matter, but whether one sees this as a justification of futility or not. This truth reveals the problem of humanity itself, and evidences a divide in the perspective of reality: the aggrivation of problem despite attempts at solution (which is thus based in the problem - which is The contradiction), or the dissolution of the problem, which allows true human agency.

We exist in a condition of knowledge. To argue as the originator of this thread does, shows that he does not understand the distictions of epistemological arenas and what science actually asserts. (As I think was pointed out by soneone earlier).

Arising_uk wrote:For myself, in my madder moments, I think you could described the process more as the initialization or boot-up or even the running process of a 3-D holographic plank-bit cellular automata, with the 3-D being in some fourth dimension to us. That is, we're in a sim on a 'god' machine of some kind.

That was my take on it too. Quite a fascinating idea. But I don't know in what way Cerveny thinks it would make the universe less determined.

Notvacka wrote:

Arising_uk wrote:For myself, in my madder moments, I think you could described the process more as the initialization or boot-up or even the running process of a 3-D holographic plank-bit cellular automata, with the 3-D being in some fourth dimension to us. That is, we're in a sim on a 'god' machine of some kind.

That was my take on it too. Quite a fascinating idea. But I don't know in what way Cerveny thinks it would make the universe less determined.

Typist would say we could explore this 4d by doing some aphilosophy. .

I would say that this unexplorable 4d is the 'effect' that can be called god. The question would be then: does our knowledge, or in what way does our ideas, express this god?

What does it mean that there is a BB theory and a Bubble theory which we argue over? Is the thread originator's idea not a valid part of this 4d expression? Is it 'true', 'a part of what is true', or if it 'false' ? How could this 4d express something not true? How could we come up with what of the 4d is not true?

lancek4 wrote:

Notvacka wrote:

Arising_uk wrote:For myself, in my madder moments, I think you could described the process more as the initialization or boot-up or even the running process of a 3-D holographic plank-bit cellular automata, with the 3-D being in some fourth dimension to us. That is, we're in a sim on a 'god' machine of some kind.

That was my take on it too. Quite a fascinating idea. But I don't know in what way Cerveny thinks it would make the universe less determined.

Typist would say we could explore this 4d by doing some aphilosophy. .

I would say that this unexplorable 4d is the 'effect' that can be called god. The question would be then: does our knowledge, or in what way does our ideas, express this god?

What does it mean that there is a BB theory and a Bubble theory which we argue over? Is the thread originator's idea not a valid part of this 4d expression? Is it 'true', 'a part of what is true', or if it 'false' ? How could this 4d express something not true? How could we come up with what of the 4d is not true?

Speak not of the dead lest they wake.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FOL2ECg ... re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=en ... FOL2ECgHDc
You can see real (3-D) growing crystal. You can see appropriate (2-D) (its) surface - extension. We should study similar models (upgraded to 4-D) regarding to our space growing ("extension")... No new Planck layer (sediment) of the time has determined its shape - it is related to quantum uncertainty... QM tries to describe just the future/history interaction - time of "now"...

Cerveny wrote:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FOL2ECg ... re=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=en ... FOL2ECgHDc
You can see real (3-D) growing crystal. You can see appropriate (2-D) (its) surface - extension. We should study similar models (upgraded to 4-D) regarding to our space growing ("extension")... No new Planck layer (sediment) of the time has determined its shape - it is related to quantum uncertainty... QM tries to describe just the future/history interaction - time of "now"...

Building a mathematical model of a four-dimensional crystal latice is one thing. Showing that it corresponds to an actual crystalline structure of space-time quite another. Do you have any suggestions regarding how your idea could be tested and thus moved from metaphyical speculation into physics proper?

Notvacka wrote:

Arising_uk wrote:...as we've long-ago given-up such metaphysics as a pointless exercise.

You have to remember that metaphysics (literally beyond physics) is pure speculation and never meant to replace physics the way Godfree is trying to do. Qualified physicists engage in metaphysical speculation too. (The many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics is a prime example.)

I'm more interested in Cerveny's line of reasoning, since he at least seems to understand the actual physics.

Metaphysics , I will have to admit I don't get the connection ,
the observational data is what I'm basing my argument on ,
the age of the image +the age of the galaxy=the minimum age of the universe .
I don't get what part of that you can't/ won't get ,,???
so put me out of my misery , and I might stop blabbing on about it ,
what part of that equation do you disagree with,,???
are you challenging the age of the images , from Hubble etc,,???
are you challenging the age given to those distant galaxies ,
ranging from young blue all the way to red and dead,,,???
or are you just refusing to see that the universe,
must be at least 20 billion years old ,
I think somewhere closer to infinity , but at least 20 billion,,,!!!
the observational data , is reality , not a theory , not maths or experiments,
real images of real galaxies , and what we are seeing ,
does not support the bbt ,,,!!!