In the beginning

[Devils' Advocate]

However most quantum physicists strongly object to any mystical/spiritual type of inference being attached to it?

Oh absolutely! lol. They have to. That potential component is not testable; thus not a question they could even consider.

The mystical/spiritual similarities to quantum physics is my own thinking. I find the similarities intriguing. And my own personal mystical/spiritual experiences align with what we understand of the quantum universe. I often wonder if there are others who think along these lines. I'm sure there are; though there is no recognized group that I am aware of.

 

[Devils' Advocate]

Reality exists in a flux, and then 'collapses' when it's observed. Any number of realities can exist, all possible realities do exist, until they're observed, and then that's the one.

Not so sure I can agree with you here. The statement is true at the quantum level. I don't think that carries forward to our perception of reality working the same way in the macro universe. The macro universe is fixed even though it is not fixed at the foundation (quantum) level. There are any number of reasons why I believe this to be true. The prime one being that we are stuck living linearly. The secondary reason is that we, of course, can not see what is going on in the micro universe with our natural senses. We can't judge the building blocks of reality in order to fix them because we cannot observe them.

Moving into your second point, about human theories of knowledge. Again I don't see how we view knowledge can have come from a point that has collapsed into a particular state because that state we set at the outset. Who is the 'we' who set this at the outset? Also human acquisition of knowledge is a very linear process. We learn something, which leads to another something, which leads to yet another something and so on into infinity.

The Big Bang theory was determined by what we observed, tested and discovered. Not the other way around. That's not saying that we have the theory right. Could be the origin of reality happened differently from our current hypothesis. And if the latter is the case, it is because we don't have the tools to see what the 'real' origin of reality is yet.

I'm not sure I'm completely understanding the point you are making though; the above is my thoughts on what I believe you were suggesting, but I feel like I'm missing a piece.....

 

[Devils' Advocate]

This is explained away by the ' anthropic principle' which effectively says: 'There may be countless other universes, but this is the only one we can know anything about, and if it HADN'T HAPPENED BY CHANCE exactly the it is, we wouldn't be here to talk about it.'

I'm not sure you are understanding this statement the way it was meant to be understood. Where you are going wrong (I think) is the random chance part of the statement. A scientist would have to say that our reality happened by statistical chance amongst gazillions of realities because there is no room in the theory for metaphysical possibilities.

That is really not relevant though. One could add to the statement "if it hadn't happened by chance or by purpose" and it doesn't change the point of the argument.

I hope I can say this right. Here's a try. We can only be here to talk about this reality because this dimension happened to be constructed (either randomly or purposefully) the way it was that allowed us to be born into existence here. This dimension happened to have all the right physics to allow stars to form as they formed, planets to form as they formed, and for life to arise and expand as it did. Does that make sense? I'm not even sure it does!

And this is where I 'have a problem' -- as they say.

And you're going to stop there????? You were just about to get into the best part of your post! What your problem is with it all. Please do carry on!

 

[wil]

There is more than one way to skin Schrödinger's cat.

 

[wil]

'There may be countless other universes, but this is the only one we can know anything about, and if it HADN'T HAPPENED BY CHANCE exactly the way it has, we wouldn't be here to talk about it.'

nope we would be there talking about it.

And there...

And there...

 

[RJM]

I'm not sure you are understanding this statement the way it was meant to be understood. Where you are going wrong (I think) is the random chance part of the statement. A scientist would have to say that our reality happened by statistical chance amongst gazillions of realities because there is no room in the theory for metaphysical possibilities.

That is really not relevant though. One could add to the statement "if it hadn't happened by chance or by purpose" and it doesn't change the point of the argument.

I hope I can say this right. Here's a try. We can only be here to talk about this reality because this dimension happened to be constructed (either randomly or purposefully) the way it was that allowed us to be born into existence here. This dimension happened to have all the right physics to allow stars to form as they formed, planets to form as they formed, and for life to arise and expand as it did. Does that make sense? I'm not even sure it does!



And you're going to stop there????? You were just about to get into the best part of your post! What your problem is with it all. Please do carry on!

Everyone knows a dog understands a lot of words.

But essentially few people are willing to stand up and be counted where the anthropic principle is used to justify impossible odds of chance.

Ok: to avoid the possibility of God.

It's Occam's Razor. Imo.
Essentially: take the simplest explanation as probably true?

But this is a bit like preaching to the converted here?

 

[Devils' Advocate]

Not completely clear on your message here.

But essentially few people are willing to stand up and be counted where the anthropic principle is used to justify impossible odds of chance.

I don't understand what the anthropic principle has to do with the odds of random chance. And why you believe the odds of chance are impossible to justify. If that is indeed your statement?

Or are you saying that the anthropic principle justifies a belief in Gods? Or it justifies a belief in Gods which is at least equal to the chance of pure randomness?

Are you saying that by Occam's Razor, the 'simplest explanation' for reality is God?

 

[Thomas]

And this is where, as the wise Indian said, 'I just might have a problem'.

LOL, I agree.

Interestingly, Roger Penrose has written a critique of Quantum Physics and cosmology in his latest work, Fashion, Faith and Fantasy, in which he argues that the prevailing theories tend to be self-affirming by coming up with their own solutions which are largely a matter of faith — the multiverse, or dimensions beyond those we can empirically determine and observe, for example, are convenient ways of explaining why things are the way they are which the community in general is too ready to buy into ...

 

[Thomas]

Hi DA.

Moving into your second point, about human theories of knowledge. Again I don't see how we view knowledge can have come from a point that has collapsed into a particular state because that state we set at the outset. Who is the 'we' who set this at the outset? Also human acquisition of knowledge is a very linear process. We learn something, which leads to another something, which leads to yet another something and so on into infinity.

OK, but I would say the entire Western philosophical tradition, which underpins its science, starts with the Greeks, and builds from there?

In the radio broadcast I mentioned, Professor Massimo Pigliucci — an atheist and skeptic — raised the issue that philosophy can help when the natural sciences reach an impermeable boundary, like the edge of our 3D world, before the Big Bang, the outreaches of Quantum speculation. Not that philosophy provides 'the answer', such a concept is firmly within the realm of empiricism, but it can provide a way of looking, or a contemplation on what is seen.

Let me digress. An alternative film-maker (Kenneth Anger) made a movie which was just a series of unrelated images. Chicken. Spade. Compass. Shoe ... that kind of thing. It turns out we watch such films, and the brain tries to organise the data into a narrative, and will actually invent a narrative to ft it all together. Sociologists conducted a number of experiments on similar lines and it's clear that's what we do. That's how we think. Whether the narrative we construct is 'real' is, of course, a whole metaphysical can of wrigglies ....

In my neuroscience readings — which I've banged on about here — one can say that, generally, the right brain is open to the totality of experience, which is awesome, wonderful, being at one with everything, etc., but it's way too much to take in. Without a filter, we couldn't get out of bed in the morning. The left brain organises that input into a manageable format and our reflections upon this 'second hand' data is the foundation of philosophy, the parent of the natural sciences ...

It has been expressed that the western mindset among First World nations evidences a tendency to a state similar to schizophrenia. We've reached the point where everything is relative, we're running a commentary on the commentary. The theist contemplates his soul, the secularist contemplates the self, but agree that the soul/self is the ultimate truth of 'me'. Nothing is real, 'reality' and 'truth' are products of the commentary, only the commentary is real, my commentary is true because it is my commentary, objective reality is negotiable.

... the above is my thoughts on what I believe you were suggesting, but I feel like I'm missing a piece.....

I feel like I'm missing a few. I feel like I'm picking up jigsaw pieces, trying to figure out what the picture is before I can figure out putting the jigsaw together.

So I'm caught in my own trap, trying to collapse a whole miasma of data bits, or bits of data, into a theory, and once I have the theory it starts to propagate its own data ... we've seen people turn up here with bonkers theories before ...

 

[Lux]

A new friend of mine is a Sunday school teacher. He explains about our 'miraculously precisely-tuned planet' to kids giving an example like this one. Even though this is too simple of an analogy intended for kids, I'm kinda impressed with the simplicity of the story.

There's this deserted island that everyone outside the island believe to be completely uninhabitable and no one has ever set foot for several decades.

A team of scientists go to the island to study the native plants and animals there and find a bonfire with a fish on a skewer on the beach.

However, no-one among the scientists suggest that they'd go find the person who made the fire and cooked the fish. Instead, they start arguing how those wood pieces could've gotten gathered by wind, and then lightning could've hit the pile of the wood, and then a little twister on the sea could've lifted a fish and dropped it on a standing long narrow piece of wood accidentally ...​

 

[RJM]

Not completely clear on your message here.



I don't understand what the anthropic principle has to do with the odds of random chance. And why you believe the odds of chance are impossible to justify. If that is indeed your statement?

Or are you saying that the anthropic principle justifies a belief in Gods? Or it justifies a belief in Gods which is at least equal to the chance of pure randomness?

Are you saying that by Occam's Razor, the 'simplest explanation' for reality is God?

Yes, I am saying that. (By Occam's Razor God is a more likely explanation for life than the anthropic principle.)

Imo

Essentially the anthropic principle requires us not only to accept that the basic properties and values -- fine tuning -- of OUR universe are accidental and incalculable, but also to accept the existence of virtually infinite other universes.

But present science cannot prove these other universes exist, and we're unable to observe or interact with them in any way.

So the most advanced level of 21st Century physics requires us to believe in something that we cannot prove or even observe.

Surely this sounds familiar?

I've posted this comment as response to DA's post, but it's meant to include everyone involved. Thanks for the interesting discussion. My thoughts are coherent, but hard to explain in just a few words, guys

 

[Devils' Advocate]

They are coherent. But hard to explain in just a few words, guys

Believe me, I feel your pain! lol. Nothing like working on a post for half an hour only to have someone negate it with a three word sentence. No matter how hard I try to make my point clear, it still gets lost in translation by another person's reading it and interpolating what I have said into words they can relate to. Which is not what I meant!

 

[RJM]

... However, no-one among the scientists suggest that they'd go find the person who made the fire and cooked the fish. Instead, they start arguing how those wood pieces could've gotten gathered by wind, and then lightning could've hit the pile of the wood, and then a little twister on the sea could've lifted a fish and dropped it on a standing long narrow piece of wood accidentally ...

Exactly.

 

[Devils' Advocate]

However, no-one among the scientists suggest that they'd go find the person who made the fire and cooked the fish. Instead, they start arguing how those wood pieces could've gotten gathered by wind, and then lightning could've hit the pile of the wood, and then a little twister on the sea could've lifted a fish and dropped it on a standing long narrow piece of wood accidentally ...

Actually this is a terrible example! Apologies, don't want to hurt your feelings. The flaw in this kind of theory is precisely the same as the old saw about if given enough time in a whirlwind all the pieces of a plane could construct that plane. It simply isn't true. Why? Because pieces of metals, plastics, etc. have no capability to self create anything.

In your example Lux, it would be rather silly for scientists to look at this campsite and think even for a moment that it came together naturally. We know what campfires are, and who makes them, and how they are put together. I hope you don't think I am nitpicking cause that is not my intent. I believe I understand the concept you are going for with this example, it is that you need a better example.

 

[Devils' Advocate]

Okay so let me try and put this together in a way that would make sense to you two and to me as well. Let's remove all the very theoretical stuff for the moment and go with just the two possibilities that this reality came together purely by chance versus this reality was put together by a deity.

I don't see any difference intrinsically between the two that makes the one or the other the more likely.

Given the time scales that we are talking about, 14+ billion years, there is more than enough time for basic elements to be created from the unimaginable heat and scale of the Big Bang. As things cooled down, the very first protons and electrons came into existence, which allowed the first elements to come along, hydrogen and helium. Next to arrive on the scene was gravity, which made the first stars. Nothing like today's stars. These were supermassive behemoths which burned hot and fast and when they came to the end of the existence they blew apart in apart in spectacular fashion and (here's the important part) these explosions created many of the heavier elements.

This is the basic process, according to science, how everything came to be. All of it is based on properties of elements that can do the things they did, unlike the parts of an airplane which cannot do anything to come together. Continuing the process along, there came stars we are familiar with, galaxies formed, and solar systems with planets in those galaxies. And so on and so on, right up to life on this little blue marble.

So reality could have come together by natural processes completely devoid of any intelligence.

Now the typical response is "But you can't tell us what happened before the Big Bang, so all of what I just wrote is based on a foundation of uncertainty. And you would be right in saying so.

However, theists are doing the very same thing. They are imagining some entity, power, being that existed before reality which put it all together. If one can speculate that a deity has always been, you must also accept the possibility that the Big Bang has always been. Why one and not the other.

 

[RJM]

But It's about the origination of LIFE.

It's actually more likely that given enough time the elements should come together and assemble themselves into the Trump tower, than that they should assemble and become ALIVE.

And that includes abiogenesis.

It's easy to Google up the truth of these odds. And to catch up on abiogenesis, which is very easy to understand. So I don't need to post links here?

And that excludes all the fine-tuning of electron and other particle masses, dark energy etc, that enable the existence of OUR universe to start with, let alone the existence of life.

The big-bang and development of scientific knowledge aren't in dispute. It's beautiful, wonderful. The Hubble images. Beyond holy.

Lux's campfire is an analogy for 'life'?

Imo

 

[Lux]

Actually this is a terrible example! Apologies, don't want to hurt your feelings. The flaw in this kind of theory is precisely the same as the old saw about if given enough time in a whirlwind all the pieces of a plane could construct that plane. It simply isn't true. Why? Because pieces of metals, plastics, etc. have no capability to self create anything.

In your example Lux, it would be rather silly for scientists to look at this campsite and think even for a moment that it came together naturally. We know what campfires are, and who makes them, and how they are put together. I hope you don't think I am nitpicking cause that is not my intent. I believe I understand the concept you are going for with this example, it is that you need a better example.

Since when do you worry about hurting my feelings? LOL ... I am touched tho

My example of a bonfire and fish, is not completely impossible to happen by chance. It can, theoretically, happen if all those wind, lightning, a twister happened exactly the way described in the story. It is 99.9% unlikely tho, and a more reasonable conclusion would be, "someone else is here on this island" ...

I think the point of this story is to show the strong unmovable belief held by those scientists that "no one else should be here" is preventing them from even considering that very possibility. I'm not saying there's no chance they could be right, like I said, it's not 100% impossible for the bonfire+fish to happen all by accident.

Roger said it. How inanimate objects became animate (and what for?) is like your example of a plane, it seems to me. For a plane to be built, there has to be a designer, a builder and a purpose for it.

You said it yourself:
"Because pieces of metals, plastics, etc. have no capability to self create anything."

I'd say the same about hydrogen, helium and any other chemical elements that exist in the universe, if you ask me.


— Why one and not the other.

This is exactly what I say to my atheist friends. (tho I know you're not exactly an atheist.) I do consider both possibilities. No one can say definitively which case reflects the true reality of our existence.

Ultimately, it's a decision, a choice, one has to make for himself. And I made my choice to believe in the transcendent mind. I realized, to me, if our lives are a product of a random chemical reaction, something that accidentally happened, logically there's nothing wrong if we also accidentally (or even intentionally) destroy ourselves and disappear from the universe. Because accidents don't have any meanings or purposes. And I felt I could not construct my life around that idea and live as if my life (and others' too) means something.

 

[wil]

Gotta love those Sunday school anologies...

Not sure how Occam's razor comes up with...well there must be an all knowing all powerful being in the sky that did all this...

Unless of course your previous ideas included someone hauling the sun across.the sky with a chariot.

Not saying their isn't a G!d... Just saying that sure isn't the simple answer.

 

[Lux]

well there must be an all knowing all powerful being in the sky that did all this...

Is it any better to believe in multiple universes when there's no evidence then?

 

[wil]

I'd say not.