Posted on 11/10/2008 11:37:17 AM PST by betty boop
In the absence of time, events cannot occur.
Or to put it another way, space and time do not pre-exist, they are created as the universe expands.
If you believe that wave mechanics is at the root, then you must also have some explanation for the origin of inertia, space and time - and of course, physical causality.
The scene of the Dodo birds in the animated film "Ice Age" comes to mind. It was hilarious, the point of the scene being that they were too stupid to survive.
Truly, as you suggest, physical causality is a presupposition of the scientific method. Theories which render time as a plane or volume are particularly troubling to many.
Penrose was especially interested in the issue raised by quantum entanglement, where the quantum states of two or more objects have to be described with reference to one another regardless of the extent to which they may be spatially separated. He speculated about what would happen if both of two entangled photons were simultaneously measured, e.g. one on the moon, one on earth.
Truly, we are merely observers "in" space/time - we cannot stand outside of it and see "all that there is" all at once. But God can and He does.
Now of course I must contend that this was exactly where Plato was wrong.
This is the problem with all apostate philosophies be it Platonism, Kantianism, etc.
Whether it be the Form, the Ideal, Freedom, or even timelessness they are all set above both God and man.
The apostate philosophy de jour will start out with a rationalist process to discover the Ideal and after a time when the immanent approach is unable to reach it the next generation then turns to the irrationalist approach of mystical discovery. The process is always the same.
But we already know the intersection of time and timelessness and his name is Jesus Christ.
If you say so. Is the universe expanding? Does time and space depend on an expanding universe? I don't know.
What is is. If we are waves, and selection events like asteroids or gamma ray bursts are waves too, then evolution reduces to destructive or constructive interference between waveforms. Reality becomes the inevitable consequence of an initial asymetry in the birth or rebirth of the universe. We are then simply the result of anti-entropic local forces in a universal sea of entropy.
To keep this on the "Second Reality" plane, however, we often see cases where "science" decides that cause and effect are related, to the point where other hypotheses stating different causes for the same effect are not tolerated.
We see this, for example, in the Global Warming debate; or in in discussions about whether or not Intelligent Design is (or can be) a "scientific" hypothesis; or about what constitutes "conditions for life to exist."
Of course, "science" in this context is primarily identical with "scientists" and what they believe about reality. The scientific method does, of course, provide a wide array of tools against which to test that reality -- but tools can always be misused. One sees a tendency among scientists to latch on to "single cause" theories.
Cosmic microwave background radiation measurements since the 1960's consistently agree that the universe is expanding - which also means there was a beginning of real space and real time.
Jastrow pointed to that observation as the most theological statement ever to come out of modern science. The first phrase of Scripture is "In the beginning, God created ..."
In the absence of space, things cannot exist.
In the absence of time, events cannot occur.
Without space/time there is no physical causation. And without space/time there are no quantum fields, waves, physical laws, constants etc.
You accept the existence of the infinite and for causation outside of time and space in terms of your religion but deny them to science.
Either they are possible or they or not.
If you like Tegmark, then you must admit to transformations. Many worlds transforms into wave function collapse (in terms of perception). Superposition transforms into classical results (again in terms of perception). And yet you believe that the universe is “expanding” even though the way you seem to use the term is meaningless. You say that in the absence of space things cannot exist and yet you base your intellectual life on their existence. You say that in the absence of time, events cannot occur. And yet your world-view depends on the opposite.
Dear grasshopper, snatch the pebble from my hand :)
Neither therefore can the term "physical causation" or any other physical terms, e.g. physical laws, operate as restrictions on God.
God is the only possible candidate for the uncaused cause (first cause) of causation.
All physical cosmologies rely on space/time for physical causation (e.g. multi-verse, multi-world, cyclic, ekpyrotic, imaginary time.) They cannot have an infinite past (plentitude argument, everything that can happen did) because there was a beginning of real space and real time. All they do is move the goal post to prior space/time which also had a beginning, i.e. a finite chain of prior physical causation.
Truly, the only closed cosmology known to me is Max Tegmark's Level IV Parallel universe which is closed precisely because it is radical Platonism. In his view, the perceptible physical world (the frog view) is a manifestation of the real mathematical structures which actually exist outside of space and time.
“The Platonic paradigm raises the question of why the universe is the way it is. To an Aristotelian, this is a meaningless question: The universe just is. But a Platonist cannot help but wonder why it could not have been different. If the universe is inherently mathematical, then why was only one of the many mathematical structures singled out to describe a universe? A fundamental asymmetry appears to be built into the very heart of reality.”
Tegmark, Max, “Parallel Universes,” Scientific American, May, 2003
Barrow, Pi in the Sky, pg. 296-297
But the frog cannot discern this because he relies first on his sensory perception for knowledge. He is a natural man. To him, the particle is in an orbit, the wave is continuous. He cannot perceive by sensory perception alone the beginning and end of it.
The bird whose perspective is Platonist - the "beyond" - discerns this. Sensory perception is not his most certain source of knowledge. Reasoning to the Platonist would trump sensory perception.
More importantly, the Christian discerns the "beyond" directly, Spiritually - even if he does not have the terms of mathematics, physics and philosophy to describe it to others.
Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know [them], because they are spiritually discerned. – I Corinthians 2:11-14
To God be the glory!
Prior to the coming of Jesus Christ,the manner in which men suffered can be catagorized by two broad categories: Stoicism and Dionysionism. Although the ancients knew nothing of free will, Stoics nevertheless exercised it, for their way of dealing with suffering might be summed up as, “Not thinking about it.” The reverse is true for the Dionysions. In their way of suffering, strong, dark impulses were ascribed to Dionysius. If they did not ‘give into’ those impulses, it was thought that they would go insane. Thus for the Stoics, whose suffering must surely have been greatly increased by the Dionysions, salvation from suffering came by ‘not thinking about it,’ while salvation for the Dionysions came by ‘giving into’ their base impulses.
In that Pride, Covetousness, Lust, Gluttony, Hate, and Envy are the fuel driving all base impulses, it becomes understandable why Nimrod—a Dionysion—declared himself ‘2 parts god, 1 part man” and tyrannized the people. Notice that by ‘giving into’ his strong impulses, Nimrod perforce, escaped into a ‘second reality,’ or a fantasy realm. In short, Nimrod’s impulses drove him to seek salvation by escaping reality. In effect, Nimrod was playing a ‘pretend game’ in which everyone else was forced into playing in order that his fantasy seem real. Salvation by escape from reality (very simply defined as God, moral conscience,guilt, and free will) is the ultimate cause of tyranny, mind-control, brainwashing, hate crime laws, speech codes, etc.
Dostoevsky tells us that we need to understand these two natures if we are to correctly diagnose the utopian irreligions-—Marxist Communism, Nat’l Socialism, Progressive Liberalism-—and their derivatives.
It is primarily the Dionysions, or the ‘terrible-willed’ as Dostoevsky calls them, who are the ones who freely ‘close their souls’ to God. For it is they who seek ‘salvation’ by usurping the throne of God. From Nimrod to Hegel, Comte, Marx, and Nietzsche, all were ‘terrible-willed’ men who sought salvation by escaping reality, empowering their will-to-power with hate, and usurping the power of the great I AM.
Just because aspects of God are outside of time and space doesn't mean that others are not in time and space. Certainly the Son and the Holy Ghost have physical and temporal qualities, but I digress. I agree that your concept of God is eternal and uncaused and outside of time and space. This is a theological statement and a belief based on faith. It cannot therefore be argued.
Philosophically and scientifically, however, it is encumbent upon you to show why one class of object, let's call it the "supernatural" can exist outside of space-time and cause events inside of space-time, but other classes of objects may not.
Tegmark and Plato may be right or they may be wrong about mathematical constructs existing outside of space-time. Clearly this is another form of the koan: "tree falling in forest with no one to hear".
It is also the core of my cosmology. Interestingly, in "Timothy" you birdies mention Dawkins repeatedly, but I have yet to see references to the memes that he invented. (I'm only half way through (I read Gatsby in 2 hours which says something about Timothy)).
There is no doubt thgat Bethoven's fifth exists in space-time. It was created in space-time by a creature of space-time. And yet it doesn't exist anymore than the Pythagorean theorem absent some medium. It moved from a mind to written music to another mind to a wax disc to vinyl to tape to cd and it will exist as long as some form of memory exists.
If you listen carefully, you will learn that you too are just a signal in the fabric of space-time. All that exists is space-time and unique peices of information contained in discrete wave packets of space-time. That includes you and me and God and Satan and ducks and pencils and all other nouns and pronouns. I forget the word used for a discrete wave packet that behaves like a wave. It was discovered in Edinburgh in the 19th century near Heriot Watt University.
Dawkins didn't get it with his memes. He thought they were physical structures in brains, but they are your theoretical information outside (but really inside) of space-time.
John Scott Russell and the solitary wave
Over one hundred and fifty years ago, while conducting experiments to determine the most efficient design for canal boats, a young Scottish engineer named John Scott Russell (1808-1882) made a remarkable scientific discovery. As he described it in his “Report on Waves”: (Report of the fourteenth meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, York, September 1844 (London 1845), pp 311-390, Plates XLVII-LVII).
``I was observing the motion of a boat which was rapidly drawn along a narrow channel by a pair of horses, when the boat suddenly stopped - not so the mass of water in the channel which it had put in motion; it accumulated round the prow of the vessel in a state of violent agitation, then suddenly leaving it behind, rolled forward with great velocity, assuming the form of a large solitary elevation, a rounded, smooth and well-defined heap of water, which continued its course along the channel apparently without change of form or diminution of speed. I followed it on horseback, and overtook it still rolling on at a rate of some eight or nine miles an hour, preserving its original figure some thirty feet long and a foot to a foot and a half in height. Its height gradually diminished, and after a chase of one or two miles I lost it in the windings of the channel. Such, in the month of August 1834, was my first chance interview with that singular and beautiful phenomenon which I have called the Wave of Translation’’.
(Cet passage en francais)
This event took place on the Union Canal at Hermiston, very close to the Riccarton campus of Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh.
For a more detailed and technical account of the solitary wave, see for example R K Bullough, “The Wave” “par excellence”, the solitary, progressive great wave of equilibrium of the fluid - an early history of the solitary wave, in Solitons, ed. M Lakshmanan, Springer Series in Nonlinear Dynamics, 1988, 150-281
Did you know that to the Pythagoreans, soul was equivalent to breath?
This makes sense because they were trying to determine the difference between what it meant to be alive or dead. Clearly dead people didn’t breath. More interesting is the story that they believed that bean plants were repositories for the soul. That’s why they forbade eating beans.
Now why would they draw these conclusions?
Same path of thought for me too. We can only see through a glass darkly . . . but I think you are right.
It’s not difficult to believe Marx’s affinity for Hegel, given his (Hegel’s) collectivist understanding of freedom and of Man (the individual). To propose that for Man to be left alone to make his own choices without interference by others is not to be free, but that Man is only free if his duty and his self-interest coincide, leaves me bereft of any defining word save one; that being ‘Orwellian’ (freedom is slavery).
But I wonder how much does Obama contemplate the mind-cracking dialectics of Marx and Hegel (William Ayers notwithstanding), or does he simply view their meanderings as a vehicle to exercise control of all our lives, our energies, and our wealth. I rather think the latter, but I’m open to persuasion.
Even so, since you self-identify as a frog and define reality as finite or more specifically, that which is contained within the boundaries of space/time (which is finite) - and betty boop and I self-identify as birds, there is no way we can "make" you see what we see.
The frog view is that mathematical structures exist "in" space/time. The mathematician invents the geometry like the composer invents the music, etc.
The bird view is that mathematical structures confirm Platonic forms by the mere presence of variables in the equations. For instance, pi is the same regardless of the size of the circle or its location anywhere in space/time. The mathematician doesn't invent the geometry, he discovers it.
In my view, the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics is like God's copyright notice on the cosmos.
In other words, there can be no God in frog-world, only an anthropomorphism of God, a “god” the frog can comprehend in his reality.
And as you will see on page 91 forward in “Timothy” – we assert that the difference between life v. non-life/death in nature is the presence verse absence of information (successful communication) - not the message (e.g. DNA) but the successful communication of the message.
I am not communicating very effectively. I am apparently neither frog nor bird. I did not mean to imply that Pi was "invented" anymore than space-time was invented. (Although you apparently do believe it was invented by God). I see the universe as an ocean and everything that exists as waves in that ocean. Pi is a feature of the ocean itself. We are now in the realm of zen where we cannot explain, but only lead. I am reading your book which gives me insight into your thinking. If you are interested, here are two books I would recommend: The Tao of Physics
http://www.amazon.com/Tao-Physics-Exploration-Parallels-Anniversary/dp/1570625190
and The Matter Myth
http://www.amazon.com/Matter-Myth-Discoveries-Challenge-Understanding/dp/0671728415
I am trying to follow your implied definition of "God". It is confusing to me in that you seem to be denying that aspects of God are temporal. This would invalidate Jesus as God. Do you birds have an explicit definition of God that includes the Trinity?
I have most of Plato's works in my library. I read everything before it goes on the shelf. I am having trouble reconciling what I know of Plato with your writings citing him.
Birds can learn as well as teach??
BTW, Tegmark was Shapiro. He chose to be Tegmark, but of course he is Shapiro too (superposition). Tegmark sits on the mountain of wisdom but is also up to his neck in saṃsÄra.
saṃsÄ = samsara
You are taking space/time, inertia and information as “given.” There is no origin in your cosmology. That’s very Aristotlean, very frog-like.
Einstein was so disturbed by the Hubble discovery, that there was a beginning of real space and real time (later affirmed by measurements of the CMB in the 1960’s) – that he “kluged” a cosmological constant. He later called that his biggest mistake. His personal, Aristotlean, cosmology required infinity past and he let that influence his reasoning.
And just like Einstein’s frog view was threatened by the beginning of real space and real time, your view also cannot appeal to an infinity past, aka the plentitude argument to justify the existence of space/time, information and inertia – i.e. wave mechanics.
Jesus is God. His life did not begin when He was enfleshed. It was His will to become incarnate. Nor can His life end.
And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all [things] he might have the preeminence. For it pleased [the Father] that in him should all fulness dwell; And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, [I say], whether [they be] things in earth, or things in heaven.– Colossians 1:15-20
Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and [that] no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. – 1 Corinthians 12:3
And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread. But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. - Matt 4:3-4
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. – John 1:1-3
Everything that was made was made by Jesus and for Jesus. His Creation is logical by His own will. If it were not, we could not understand any of it. That is why I see the "unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics" as His copyright notice on the cosmos.
And He spoke “all that there is” into existence – hence, the wave phenomena.
By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth. – Psalms 33:6
God’s Name is I AM and Alpha and Omega. He is not time-bound.
Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am. – John 8:58
I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty. – Revelation 1:8
I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. – Revelation 22:13
Scripture speaks of the Trinity here (Spirit, Spirit of Christ, Spirit of God:)
To God be the glory!
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