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Post by alancalverd on Jan 13, 2014 19:29:31 GMT 1
How could an organism without any eyes observe the hydrogen spectrum? You are assuming all intelligent life in the universe is broadly similar to us but you have no evidence of this and therefore should not assume we all observe the same thing. Most of the hydrogen spectrum is invisible to the human eye. One of its most scientifically important components is the 21 cm line, easily mapped by a radiotelescope but way below our sensory threshold. I've spent an entire and very satisfying career detecting and measuring things that do not affect our senses directly, but clearly have a powerful effect on anything, intelligent or otherwise, made of atoms.
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Post by alancalverd on Jan 13, 2014 19:33:18 GMT 1
All we have are models of reality. /quote] On the contrary, we have both direct and indirect observations of quantum phenomena. The fact that you can read this is because real photons cause real chemical reactions in what I presume are your real eyes. But we have to use models like molecular orbitals to explain how it happens.
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Post by mrsonde on Jan 14, 2014 5:50:47 GMT 1
An interpretation isn't an experience; it's not even a theory.
I haven't rejected his ideas - I've pointed out that they were not how you characterised them. The "many histories concept" is not that "all possible histories exist simultaneously". That's the many worlds concept - supporters of which seem to find it convenient to try to enlist Feynman's ideas as support for their own by brushing over the key differences. Feynman did not believe that all possible histories of particles all existed - his argument was that their possible paths existed, and that by summing them - in exactly the same way that matrix mechanics produces the same calculations as Schrodinger's wavefunction - you arrive at an accurate probabilistic determination of the actual path that was existentially followed (a little more complicated than that, but not in a way that changes this essential point.) An appropriate analogy is with the average geodesic path of inertial mass in the presence of a gravitational field (which is why he chose to see the matter in this way - as a promising line to bring GR into line with QM, or vice versa) - the hypothesis that mass curves the metric of spacetime, so that gravitational attraction arises as a simple result of mass moving in a straight line. In Feynman's hypothesis the possible paths are like the contours of a valley on a map. (The key difference is that this is a mathematical space rather than a "real" one.) A better analogy in case you're still thinking that contours on a map still exist is the sort of range of possibilities you can consider when estimating the probable outcome of an event in retrospect - say, the throwing of a number of heads or tails in a row. You consider the total range of possible H and T combinations. These don't "exist" - only the actual result exists.
A simple slip of the pen. He has unambiguously stated his genuine views on the matter in the clearest possible terms, both before and after.
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Post by mrsonde on Jan 14, 2014 6:17:47 GMT 1
Your collision at speed with a rock would not be an "abstract idea", I'm afraid.
Your arguments are all woven out of the inadequate analysis of experience mentioned above. You're the prisoner of your set of concepts - your "abstract ideas". You need to start again with a better set - the ones you're limiting yourself to at the moment, leading you to these solipsist conclusions, were all around before the middle of the 18th Century - even "things in themselves" is originally Thomist, not Kantian. Science and philosophy understands the nature of experience far better now.
You have thus far argued that this "noumenal realm" consists only of "probability waves" or else, when they have been collapsed by an observer, is entirely phenomenal - reality is entirely "subjective experience", is how you've put it several times. So - no, we are not talking about the same thing in the least. You have taken one particular "fantasy" and argued that it is "scientific fact", proven time and time again. The equivalent "fantasy" is merely a result of our mental formulations of patterns woven from our perceptions. I don't agree with either viewpoint, as a matter of fact.
What "scientific observations" could you possibly refer to that show things only exist once they're observed? That space does not exist until it's been measured, for example?
I'm not talking metaphorically. I'm referring specifically at the moment to perceptual illusions; not artistic creations, anyone's ambitions, or philosophical beliefs. Though there are similar problems there that your theory is equally as incapable of addressing. Just stick to perceptual illusions for the moment, if you would. You do know what they are, don't you?
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Post by mrsonde on Jan 14, 2014 7:09:27 GMT 1
Well, one of the problems with assuming things are there whether observers are about or not is that it is impossible to prove. So, however much commonsense might persuade you that the Atlantic Ocean must have always have existed before people explored it you can never actually prove it logically. I have addressed at length the confusions and misunderstandings about the nature of logic and proof in this assertion several times before. You have totally ignored that help, and continue repeating the same mistakes as though nobody had pointed out your errors. This is what I mean when I say you do not adhere to the standards of logic or civilised debate. But I'll repeat myself, again, briefly: This is what a logical proof is: All Moons are round. Anything that is round is made of cheese. Therefore the Moon is made of cheese. The proposition that things in reality exist whether observed or not is an empirical proposition. "Proof" of empirical propositions is a different concept than logical "proof". (It's connected, to be sure - but the fascinating question of how need not concern us - yet, at least. We'll see if we can ever advance this conversation beyond the point it was when it began twenty or so pages ago!) There it consists of an evaluation of evidence. Your diktat rules out any possibility of evidence, for anything. But your diktat is false, and we do not accept it. Thus, we still have a meaningful notion of evidence - we still have the possibility of access to reality independent of our experience. And all the evidence points to its existence - it's perfectly adequately "proved", thankyou. All our experience makes sense if this hypothesis is true; if it is not, we cannot make sense of our experience (the prediction of the existence of Neptune, in Fascinating's example.) So not a Catch-22 situation at all. On the other hand, you genuinely are irredemiably trapped in a paradox of your own making. You are making an assertion about the nature of reality that you claim is true. Your assertion is that reality does not exist unless and until it is observed. Yet you cannot by your own theory observe this claimed aspect of reality. It cannot therefore be true of reality, because by your own definitions the only things true of reality are things observed. You do now know what you mean by anything "in itself". So how are you so certain of this assertion? As far as I'm concerned, any thing "in itself" is energy in a specific form in space and time. I see no reason that any form can not be specified to whatever detail one may hope for - we are unable to do this "ultimately", as yet, but I see no reason we might be able to one day: perhaps arrive at a degree of knowledge where, say, all the strings that make up every particle and all the relations between them can be exhaustively accounted for (in the same sort of way we can now, say, specify every gene and their sequence in a nematode worm.) You are certainly in no position to insist so dogmatically that we will never be able to do this. As for the energy that ex hypothesi the strings or whatever are themselves composed of, "in themselves", I do not see any meaning in the application of the term "knowledge" here. On the other hand, it seems to me that we experience energy, all the time. If that isn't "direct knowledge", I don't think the expression can have any meaning whatsoever. You are very seriously confused by the terms you're using in your own philosophy, abacus. You're trapped in the conceptual scheme elaborated by Kant yet you're using those concepts with definitions entirely your own. Why? You're getting the worst of both worlds. Formally by Kant, in the mid-18th Century. Philosophical and scientific analysis has moved on! Not "only", no. Not "just", no. I keep telling you: this is your fundamental mistake. Primary qualities are not only appearances - they exist in the world. They're what we know of the world - through them we have access to reality beyond our experience. Deny this, and you're stuck with Berkeley - and Hume, and ultimately, by your own denial, thoroughoing solipsism. Accept it as an overwhelmingly well-proven empirical truth, and then the world is explicable - not just the world outside of our experience, but the world within too: our perceptual abilities, our reasoning abilities, our linguistic abilities, how we are able to understand the world and develop working technolgies, how we are able to correct things like perceptual illusions, or inadequate theories, or defunct conceptual sets. Even if you insist on sticking to your instrumentalist view of theory formation, the theory that primary qualities are real is far more "true" and "proven" than your contrary view, which can explain nothing, even on your own terms.
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Post by abacus9900 on Jan 14, 2014 10:07:13 GMT 1
How could an organism without any eyes observe the hydrogen spectrum? You are assuming all intelligent life in the universe is broadly similar to us but you have no evidence of this and therefore should not assume we all observe the same thing. Most of the hydrogen spectrum is invisible to the human eye. One of its most scientifically important components is the 21 cm line, easily mapped by a radiotelescope but way below our sensory threshold. I've spent an entire and very satisfying career detecting and measuring things that do not affect our senses directly, but clearly have a powerful effect on anything, intelligent or otherwise, made of atoms. There has to be some kind of visual representation of the hydrogen spectrum, however.
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Post by abacus9900 on Jan 14, 2014 10:09:32 GMT 1
All we have are models of reality. /quote] On the contrary, we have both direct and indirect observations of quantum phenomena. The fact that you can read this is because real photons cause real chemical reactions in what I presume are your real eyes. But we have to use models like molecular orbitals to explain how it happens. Sorry, Alan, you're just not getting this. You have to think beyond the scientific method to see what I'm getting at.
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Post by abacus9900 on Jan 14, 2014 10:30:49 GMT 1
An interpretation isn't an experience; it's not even a theory. I haven't rejected his ideas - I've pointed out that they were not how you characterised them. The "many histories concept" is not that "all possible histories exist simultaneously". That's the many worlds concept - supporters of which seem to find it convenient to try to enlist Feynman's ideas as support for their own by brushing over the key differences. Feynman did not believe that all possible histories of particles all existed - his argument that their possible paths existed, and that by summing them - in exactly the same way that matrix mechanics produces the same calculations as Schrodinger's wavefunction - you arrive at an accurate probabilistic determination of the actual path that was existentially followed (a little more complicated than that, but not in a way that changes this essential point.) An appropriate analogy is with the average geodesic path of inertial mass in the presence of a gravitational field (which is why he chose to see the matter in this way - as a promising line to bring GM into line with QM, or vice versa) - the hypothesis that mass curves the metric of spacetime, so that gravitational attraction arises as a simple result of mass moving in a straight line. In Feynman's hypothesis the possible paths are like the contours of a valley on a map. (The key difference is that this is a mathematical space rather than a "real" one.) A better analogy in case you're still thinking that contours on a map still exist is the sort of range of possibilities you can consider when estimating the probable outcome of an event in retrospect - say, the throwing of a number of heads or tails in a row. You consider the total range of possible H and T combinations. These don't "exist" - only the actual result exists. But none of this is reality; it is just an interpretation of information obtained via scientific experiments. It is a proposed model of our conscious interaction with "things out there." In short, it is whatever works, so it is no different from what our stone-age ancestors did when they shaped a piece of flint in order to create a cutting tool. Pays yer money and takes yer choice. With all due respect to Alan, I don't think he's really in this discussion yet. This is understandable because people with scientific training tend to think in a particular way out of habit and it can be hard to make them think laterally.
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Post by abacus9900 on Jan 14, 2014 12:55:25 GMT 1
Your collision at speed with a rock would not be an "abstract idea", I'm afraid. Your arguments are all woven out of the inadequate analysis of experience mentioned above. You're the prisoner of your set of concepts - your "abstract ideas". You need to start again with a better set - the ones you're limiting yourself to at the moment, leading you to these solipsist conclusions, were all around before the middle of the 18th Century - even "things in themselves" is originally Thomist, not Kantian. Science and philosophy understands the nature of experience far better now. You keep arguing from a a posteriori position, that is, using inductive reasoning where knowledge is determined through empirical evidence. I, on the other hand, am arguing from a a priori position where knowledge is based on reason alone and has nothing to do with experience. For example, 40 + 5 = 45 is an a priori statement. So, to state that we may only ever know about reality via our human senses is a a priori statement because it is a self-evident truth. There is no need to test this statement empirically because it is an inescapable truth based on reason alone.
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Post by abacus9900 on Jan 14, 2014 13:05:31 GMT 1
No, no. Once again you misunderstand. I never said the noumenal realm consisted of anything because to state that would imply we have direct experience of it but that is impossible. Probability waves are just the human expression or model of something that gives rise to them through our human perceptions. What that something is will forever be hidden from us. Am I getting through yet?
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Post by fascinating on Jan 14, 2014 15:35:06 GMT 1
Abacus, you have just said in the last reply
Then in the next sentence you said
So firstly you imply that there is isn't anything, then you say there is something.
Before we go any further, can you explain your apparent inconsistency here.
I would like to suggest that you believe in a "something" because you are saying that we interact with that something to bring about reality. Therefore there has to be something to interact with; it cannot be said that there is absolutely nothing there.
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Post by fascinating on Jan 14, 2014 16:00:48 GMT 1
I have a lot of sympathy with your views Abacus, except that your system lacks cogent structure, and you don't seem to be using words in a way that can be clearly understood.
I am familiar with the idea that sub-atomic particles can come into existence in space, without apparent cause. They are not created out of absolutely nothing because first there is space, and energy (I think) and time. Whether, and where, the particles arise is governed by chance (I think), which relates somewhat to the idea of "probability waves", you could say.
Chance could be the ultimate explanation of everything. Those who believe in God, when asked where God came from, would say, "Well the Universe has always been ruled by God, that's just the way things are." In other words, by chance, that's the way things happen to be.
An alternative explanation of why the Universe exists is to say "Well there could have been nothing, or there could have been something, in this binary situation, it just so happens that the bit was set to 1, by chance". And it has been theorised that many Universes, with many different combinations of "laws" have popped into existence, just chancing to appear (because outside Universes there is no law so anything (or nothing) can happen).
But in your system you are invoking, I think, an idea of humans interacting with things in indertiminate states. They must observe one of these states to make it physically real.
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Post by abacus9900 on Jan 14, 2014 16:24:01 GMT 1
Abacus, you have just said in the last reply Then in the next sentence you said So firstly you imply that there is isn't anything, then you say there is something. Before we go any further, can you explain your apparent inconsistency here. I would like to suggest that you believe in a "something" because you are saying that we interact with that something to bring about reality. Therefore there has to be something to interact with; it cannot be said that there is absolutely nothing there. Well, this is the inadequacy of language in trying to express things that lie outside our normal experiences. Allow me to re-phrase. Obviously, there exists something out there that is beyond human perceptions but whatever it is gets transformed into something that our senses can handle. Remember my analogy of the colourful scene being photographed by a black and white camera? The black and white camera has no way of representing any colour so what it does is provide a black an white image instead, which it is designed to produce due to its design and in an analogous manner we humans can only represent things that exist in terms of phenomena, which is the name we give to stuff we can perceive. There are some snakes that can sense infra-red rays and other animals that can detect audio frequencies that we cannot because they have evolved the sensory paraphernalia to do so. Now, humans being can detect these things by using special measuring apparatus but they cannot perceive them directly through their senses because they have not evolved to do so. So, when I stated that the noumenal realm does not consist of anything, anything in this context means something we can define which, of course, we cannot since we do not have direct access to it. It's like saying the colourful scene in my analogy does not contain anything that the black and white camera can register in terms of colour.
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Post by abacus9900 on Jan 14, 2014 16:49:59 GMT 1
I have a lot of sympathy with your views Abacus, except that your system lacks cogent structure, and you don't seem to be using words in a way that can be clearly understood. I am familiar with the idea that sub-atomic particles can come into existence in space, without apparent cause. They are not created out of absolutely nothing because first there is space, and energy (I think) and time. Whether, and where, the particles arise is governed by chance (I think), which relates somewhat to the idea of "probability waves", you could say. Chance could be the ultimate explanation of everything. Those who believe in God, when asked where God came from, would say, "Well the Universe has always been ruled by God, that's just the way things are." In other words, by chance, that's the way things happen to be. An alternative explanation of why the Universe exists is to say "Well there could have been nothing, or there could have been something, in this binary situation, it just so happens that the bit was set to 1, by chance". And it has been theorised that many Universes, with many different combinations of "laws" have popped into existence, just chancing to appear (because outside Universes there is no law so anything (or nothing) can happen). But in your system you are invoking, I think, an idea of humans interacting with things in indertiminate states. They must observe one of these states to make it physically real. Well, the problem is that when we keep asking questions about the universe it raises even more questions and as soon as someone has proposed a sensible model in order to account for the data derived from scientific experiments someone else raises problems with it and by a continuous process of peer review a general agreement may or may not be reached about which model is the best. However, because we are in the realm of philosophy rather than science, none of these models can be tested in the laboratory. Having said that, it is still the case that, a priori, we may never have direct experience of anything outside of our perceptive abilities. This requires no scientific experiment to confirm because it is a deductive statement of truth. It is a fundamental foundation of all philosophical and scientific thought and alway will be. If I said to you that the woman who gave birth to you will always be your natural mother or that 2+2 will always equal 4 it would be making a priori statements. "A priori" literally means "from what comes before", so you can see such statements can never be questioned or reversed since attempting to do so would destroy the whole edifice of scientific thought and we would be left with an Alice in Wonderland kind of world where : "When I use a word, Humpty Dumpy said in a rather scornful tone, it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less."
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Post by alancalverd on Jan 14, 2014 18:51:07 GMT 1
There has to be some kind of visual representation of the hydrogen spectrum, however. Why? The computer that maps the cosmos doesn't have eyes, and its calculation of the redshift of the hydrogen spectrum of a distant galaxy, and hence is speed of recession, doesn't depend on human intervention. I can design a system that automatically launches a missile to seek and destroy anything that emits infrared radiation. No visual representation needed to respond to a quantum phenomenon and do something about it. The fact that I'm now alive and the other pilot is splattered over the ground is known as grim reality.
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