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Post by Jeff on Nov 21, 2005 12:38:07 GMT -5
Ty,
That's easy. Just as you say, we dismiss all notion of objective time and space. Call 4 sequential hydrogen atoms, H1-H4. H1 inherits from H4, that is H4 would be considered in the past of H1 if time were objective--but it's not. H2 inherits from H1 and so on till H4 passes along its inheritable parts to H1.
Notice that we have defined a time loop in this way--also a space loop if we are talking about physical constitution as well as inheritance. That is one kind of cycle. But mostly what we mean by cycles are new entities recapitulating the patterns that have come before. This we would describe with physical laws and there need be no time loop whatsoever.
But inheritance and constitution do seem to be fundamental categories for describing things that actually exist. I think you have an idea about how to get rid of them. And I'd love to drop my oppositional stance and merely listen to your thoughts on this issue.
PS sorry that I used four hydrogen atoms in my example. For some reason I remembered that number instead of the number you gave. The example would work the same no matter how many atoms you had.
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Post by Tyler on Nov 22, 2005 19:52:14 GMT -5
But there's still no "comes from". In all these scenario's there is an "always been". If you expand the four atoms to what we currently have, you have what we currently have. There isn't a primary point at which it all began. Most of big or little physics is counter intuitive, but does follow along cycles. Thus, it makes sense to imagine that prior to the big bang there was something involving the matter that is in our universe now. There is no reason to belive that there was less or more. We'll not have the evidence for prior to the big bang material or behaviors during our lifetimes (unless I get to live forever). But there still isn't a reason to believe in a moment where matter was "created".
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Post by Jeff on Nov 22, 2005 22:07:58 GMT -5
Sure there is a "comes from" in the sense that for any given entity it always makes sense to ask what it is inheriting from and what it is constituted by. So, for the entities at the origin of the sequence (however you want to understand that), we can ask these questions, too. As you seem to admit when you write: "Thus, it makes sense to imagine that prior to the big bang there was something involving the matter that is in our universe now." It does make sense, though your explanation is one of many, and one that could not be extended infinitely without absurdity. Let's take your suggestion seriously. Either the cycle is an entity itself or it's not. If it is, then we can ask where it came from in the two senses that I've mentioned. If it is not, then for the entity at the apparent origin, the start of the sequence from our point of view, we can ask these two questions. Either way, it makes sense to ask. Suppose the latter case--I think that is the one you want, anyhow. Now, since we cannot exist as the result of an infinite series of events that take up some time (which is not the same thing as saying that they exist in objective time), it follows that there must be some state/entity from which any series of events must have begun--or from which any sequence of entities must start. Of course, we could just say that there is no sufficient reason that explains this origin. That is possible, but it means admitting the existence of "surd" events that have no reckoning within any possible explanation of the universe. Either way, we are doing real philosophy at this point. Long before we get here, science has to admit, "We just don't know." PS This is what we are really talking about: plato.stanford.edu/entries/cosmological-argument/ (See how important arguments for the existence of God are even if She doesn't exist!) PPS Your arguments seem most like those presented in 4.5 "A Non-finite Universe". PPPS Mine are most like the Kalam argument, which I would defend as Craig defends the impossibility of an actual infinite.
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Post by Tyler on Nov 23, 2005 0:05:19 GMT -5
I'll simplify it greatly. I have come to the conclusion after much reading and thinking that the universe is cyclical. That there was no beginning point and will be no ending point. There are no entities, just various levels of entropy.
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Post by Jeff on Nov 23, 2005 10:03:58 GMT -5
Okay, I am taking a step back with you:
1. There may be no entities, but there is something rather than nothing. Where did the something come from?
2. You suggest that the something goes round in an infinite cycle. First, that does not really answer the first question. At least there is a prima facie case to be made for the sense of asking where the stuff in the original cycle came from. If you think not, then the burden of proof must be on you to prove that it makes no sense to ask. (Bertrand Russell once adopted a similar line of thought.) Second, what is your evidence for this cycle view? I am keenly interested in knowing how we should reason about origins correctly.
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Post by Tyler on Nov 23, 2005 12:16:01 GMT -5
Why does the something have to come from something. And if there is a something for the thing to come from, doesn't it, by the same logic, imply that that something had to come from something else. You're left with turtles all the way down. I have no homunculus, and even if I do, he certainly doesn't have one. There is no origional cycle. There are no turtles. Most of the universe shows evidence of cycles in all things and at all levels. The only reason we imagine that there is an origional moment is that the idea of eternity is hard to grasp.
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Post by Jeff on Nov 23, 2005 13:08:00 GMT -5
Written quickly and not proofed. Please forgive and errors:
1. Why does the something have to come from something.
Now that is a question! I’ve been reading back over my old posts, and I don’t think I’ve made it sufficiently clear that I have no special access to these facts. My answers of themselves are no more plausible than anyone else’s. We are doing philosophy when we get to questions like this. Even scientists who pretend answers to these questions are really doing philosophy. We could discuss the criteria for good metaphysical answers, but those are always up for grabs, too.
What we can say is that science works by generating counterfactuals and testing them. At least that is what we are told. Hypotheses by nature have to be testable, according to science. This is the way it distinguishes itself from superstition and supernatural explanations which cannot be adequately tested. How would we ever test the idea that something comes from nothing? “Here is a something that comes from nothing!” The scientist might say. “I will test it by noting some antecedent state of the universe that led to it.” But if the scientist manages to reproduce the event, then he has engineered a cause. It may be complex and beyond our ken, but it is still some kind of cause.
The realm of quantum physics might offer you some kind of aid. But look what happens there. When we give up ideas like parity and causality, the absolute best the scientists can say is, “Hey, all I know is that the equations work.” But mathematics in itself makes no predictions about the world whatever. To get science, you have to add some assumptions about the way things are. And it is difficult to imagine giving up causality as one of those assumptions. In fact, when you do you lose the power to imagine or conceive the universe. You lose the ability to generate counterfactuals. You lose scientific understanding.
All that’s left, at that point, is pure reason. You can retreat to mathematics, as some scientists do. But again, that is not how we normally conceive of science. Alternatively, you can start doing philosophy. But if you do you must start from some set of categories. What should they be? Category theorists from Aristotle to Kant to Whitehead tell us causality is something basic. Now, Whitehead does suggest that it might be derivative from inheritance and constitution, as I’ve argued here. But there is nothing more basic. Every event in his system is radically finite…save one. And you can guess what that one is.
2. And if there is a something for the thing to come from, doesn't it, by the same logic, imply that that something had to come from something else.
Exactly. So long as we are talking about finite events/entities then we are dealing with an actual infinity and this is physically impossible.
3. You're left with turtles all the way down.
If that is so, then you’ve abandoned reason. Don’t get me wrong. Maybe we should abandon it. That is why the cosmological argument for God’s existence really comes down to how deeply we hold The Principle of Sufficient Reason, which Leibniz (probably my favorite pre-Whiteheadian modern) framed as follows:
"But in order to proceed from mathematics to natural philosophy, another principle is required, as I have observed in Theodicy; I mean the principle of sufficient reason, namely, that nothing happens without a reason why it should be so rather than otherwise."
If we give this up, then we just say there is no reason why the universe exists. There is no answer to the question of why there is something rather than nothing. Fine. But this means there is no scientific answer either. There is just no answer. The honest scientist who gives up the principle must simply say, “We don’t know.” And in such fundamental issues, he should make clear his metaphysical assumptions by quickly adding, “And we will never know so long as science is science as it works today.”
4. There are no turtles. So, clearly you do not abandon the principle of sufficient reason. This means that you must face the original problem of the actual infinite. That is where our disagreement must lie. 5. Most of the universe shows evidence of cycles in all things and at all levels. But even if the universe is following some eternal cycle it still makes sense to ask, “How did it start?” If the universe is a perpetual motion machine. What made it and what gave it its original energy. If you say, “Some other state of the universe,” then you merely delay the question. What made that state, and so on. If at this point you say turtles all the way down, then you ARE giving up the principle of sufficient reason, after all. And again, that’s fine. But it’s not science.
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Post by Betterout on Nov 23, 2005 13:15:19 GMT -5
Tyler,
I personally don't have an agenda in asking what came before the bang(s). I'm not, for instance, saying 'everything comes from something, except God, and ultimately everything comes from God.' My own faith in God's existence is pretty unshakable at this point, so even if it were shown scientifically that the cycles (and therefore the matter) have always existed and could easily be explained away, then it wouldn't upset my belief in God one whit. God is just part of my system, whether I like it or not. And in fact, like you, I was squarely a part of the bouncing-rubber-ball cosmos camp until a couple of years ago, when it was shown that our universe will most likely not undergo a red to blue shift, collapsing back in on itself. So, I would like nothing more than for the universe to be so regular. Unfortunately, that just doesn't seem to be the case according to current calculations of the actual amount of mass in the universe (not enough mass to slow the expansion caused by this last bang).
But, still, doesn't it seem just the slightest bit odd to you that the matter has simply always existed, with no beginning or end at all? (And for the record, I don't mind that sort of weirdness much when it comes to God's existence, because my God is wacky like that; I freely admit that my current concept of God isn't even 100% compatible with how I think things work on a day-to-day basis, no matter how much I would like it to be). But we're talking about physical stuff here. And we're so convinced in our modern thought that, as Jeff pointed out, we really believe everything in the universe has a predecessor and a successor. It just seems strange to say, 'yes, everything comes from something else and then goes on to be something else. Everything, that is, except everything.' Again, I have no real agenda in asking such questions: I DON'T HAVE A CLUE WHAT THE ANSWERS REALLY ARE. But I'm at least interested in looking to ultimate origins, at the places where physics and metaphysics converge, and I wonder how you personally feel about them, too.
Maybe you're right. We can't exactly, after all, get rid of or create matter. It always comes and goes, either as energy or substance, and we're pretty much stuck with what we have now. Maybe that's a case for the fact that the universe has always existed and always will exist. But in that case, it makes it even harder to conceptualize a big whimper, doesn't it?
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Post by Jeff on Nov 23, 2005 14:33:21 GMT -5
This is directly relevant to our discussions: Theory of Anything? Physicist Lawrence Krauss turns on his own. www.slate.com/id/2131014/"Einstein's theories paved the way for nuclear power. Quantum mechanics spawned the transistor and the computer chip. What if 21st-century physicists refuse to deliver anything solid without a galaxy-sized accelerator? "String theory is textbook post-modernism fueled by irresponsible expenditures of money," Nobel Prize-winner Robert Laughlin griped to the San Francisco Chronicle earlier this year... Goodbye, Department of Physics. Hello, String Studies." The state of physics today is, I'd argue, a direct result of the death of God. It's what happens when you tell people there is no intellectually respectable way to talk about ultimates: They do it without realizing it.
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Post by Jeff on Nov 23, 2005 15:02:21 GMT -5
Just to be clear: I am not arguing that God exists. I am not arguing that the Cosmological Argument for God's existence is sound. And I am not arguing that we should adopt the principle of sufficient reason.
I am arguing for sets of consequences that attach to any assumptions that we make concerning these ultimates.
So, like Justin, I am not grinding any axes here. (Well, the link to the Slate story was an axe, but my own arguments attempt to make all of their assumptions explicit. I fail at this sometimes, of course.)
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