Please rebut this post

[James Hodge]

 

 

 

 

 Hi, I will try to lay out my understanding as simply as I can and I want someone to convince me I am barking up the wrong tree. Okay, so this thing called God is omniscient omnipresent, everlasting and infinite right? I mean theoretically.So then it must be everywhere at once. So it is All That Is, by definition. Okay, so we know that God is  All That Is, by definition. Now the question cannot be; "does All That Is exist?" but rather, should it start with capitals? I mean is it conscious and self aware? Now I could say the fact that All that is contains self aware individuals shows that All That Is must be somewhat conscious but this might be seen as somewhat of a tautology.Yet, however, Young's double slit experiment shows that particles of light are collapsed from waves to particles by consciousness and this experiment has been replicated with particles as large as Carbon60 molecules. So we know that even tiny, insignificant particles react to conscious human awareness. So this proves that all things are linked by some non physical force called consciousnes...So All That Is has conscious self awareness.

 

This is a logical fallacy called a "scope shift"

A tree is made up of a bunch of cells

therefor a bunch of cells are a tree and all a tree is is a bunch of cells

well no, a tree has emergeant qualities over and above what a bunch of cells do

and a bunch of cells could just as easily not constitute a tree

 

I don't know if I could articulate this well, but I hope it gets the jist across

 

I think I get what your saying and I think I agree. The fact that our universe (or an entity) is made up of things does not mean 'a group of things' are an entity, right? What I am pondering is, are people correct to refer to our universe as an entity? Well, it does seem to be self organising with emergent qualities. We and animals could be likened to twigs and leaves. It organised itself into beings that can self accuate.

 

Do we have any way of knowing yet? 

It is a scope shift because the scope of the conclusion is wider than the scope of the evidence for it.

To clarify: "this is famously exemplified by the fallacy in Bertrand Russel’s reasoning where Russell cites the example of a stick half-immersed in water which appears bent even though it is not to argue that because the stick is not bent it must not be the actual stick we are seeing in order to argue that what we perceive are not physical, mind-independent objects, but Sense Data, mind-dependent objects which we conjure into existence Wittgenstein identified a fundamental flaw in this argument, claiming that the semantics of the suggestion that we see “something”  bent was a rhetorical ploy which begs the question by assuming that because we see perceive something bent, something bent actually exists."

 

You mean knowing that the universe organises itself? Well it seems strikingly obvious to me, especially if you consider that the mathmatical equations that allow existence are also part of the universe. There is enourmous evidence that the universe is self organising. You are exhibit A. Even if you came to be here by a mathmatical fluke, that was still set up by the universe. The universe has organised itself into planets, galaxies and beings that dwell therein. As for the Bertrand Russel thing, your eyes recieve photons, which send messages to your brain, which the creates an image based on a translation of those photons. So when you see a stick, you are really only seeing your brains version of what a stick is. This is how hypnosis works, if you can get the brain to translate the information differently, a person will see a bent stick when everyone around them sees a straight stick. So no, we are not seeing the stick itself but a version of it we create.

[RestoringGuy]

 

If the observation device interferes with the wave, how so? It is a recorder set up over both slits to recieve photons that were already there, it is not adding anything to the equation. As for 'know', yes well , like I said it is not being interfered with yet it changes it function, so I can't say it reacts as there is nothing to react to. If you could explain to me how  the recorder device interferes with the wave, I'd appreciate it. Another person recently pointed out to me thtat mathmatical equations are non-physical things that are real.

 

As I understand it, if the observation device is so lightweight as to not disturb the wave, it too will become uncertain like a wave until it is observed by something else (like our eyes) that is big and heavy enough to collapse the waves.

[TheRobin]

 

 

You seem to use the word "truth" and "verify" in a manner that doesn't need reality accompanying it.
"verify", as I understand it, is when you check whether a claim about reality actually matches that reality. Mathematics doesn't make such claims to begin with.
Math can be validated (as in checked against the premises to see if it holds logically) and can be correct or incorrect. But I don't see how truth or verification comes into play when doing math.

 

I use the words in the sense that verification requires physical reality.  But truth does not, because we all seem to accept a truth even after the verification experiment has been destroyed (otherwise how can you say that things are real once they become momentarily unobserved, you have now lost the physical link you have to them).  For a thing to be "real", must it not reproducibly persist in order to demonstrate it is not simply a mental construct?

 

Maybe
as a better example: You can validate the conclusion of a syllogism
relative to its premises, but that's not the same as saying the
conclusion or its premises are true. So validation and verficiation are
two different things. Or at least the way I use and understand the
terms. But if verification and truth don't have anythign to do with
reality, then pretty much anything could hypotheically called "true", so
I don't see how it would be useful to use them that way.

 

That is a good way to phrase it.  Conclusions are relative to the premises.  But whether or not that is true is the mathematical fact that is being uncovered.  If mathematics shows "A implies B", I am not saying B is inherently true or real.  I am saying that the full sentence "A implies B" is true and real.  No, you can't call pretty much anything "true", because the negative claim is false.  If you concede that mathematics can prove "A implies B", then it is a reproducible truth and further the negation "A and not B" can never be true, it is universally falsifiable.  Reality is not exclusively that which is physically tangible; one cannot touch gravity yet most people describe gravity as real.   A thing can be said to be "real" so long as it's testable/provable, and whether it is made of solid matter at a given moment does not seem relevant.  By checking whether something "actually matches reality", what are the things you are comparing?  Your belief is compared to some observation, and to weed out errors that test must be repeatable, correct?  Furthermore, whether or not that belief leads to predictable future events, that also lends credibility to that belief.  Yet when we make a mathematical proof, we present a physical artifact (a "proof") that our conjecture is true, verifiable by other mathematicians.  It predicts future events, because we now know which side of the fence (true/false) the conjecture must fall for all mathematicians in all of time.

I think this is relevant because the claims about quantum mechanics and consciousness are plagued with strange conclusions about psychic powers, or the alternate view that somehow QM is irrelevant because our minds are thought to be deterministic pinball machines and that we cannot "know" anything unless the atoms of our brain are externally forced into doing so.  By emphasizing mathematics, I am saying there is a mathematical world that is verifiable.  It is testable.  You can build a bunch of computers and they will all behave the same general way.  We need not test every object to say gravity is real and predicts future events.  But we believe a gravitational law is likely to be true on a new planet never visited.  Mathematics is perhaps more real, holding everywhere.  To explain how we can know about this kind of truth (rather than call math an imaginary construct), our brains require a way to discover such things (QM), and a way to subject them to physical verification (experiments with computers and various stochastic and deterministic methods).

 

 

I used the word "real" a bit too loosely here, what I meant was external reality (i.e. everything that doesn't just happen in our heads as thoughts and intangible abstractions, and in regards to gravity: I'd call the movement of stuff very much tangible).

The key difference being, that physical reality can't err while we can err with our thoughts, so giving both the characteristics of being equally proofable or true takes away that important difference imo. Mathematics is proofen by other people agreeing or disagreeing with what is presented. Claims about external realty are proofen if reality behaves that way.
That's why I see there being two different distinct words for each and not just one for both (the word "proof" goes for both, so I don't see the need to use "verify" in the same way and ignore "validate" completely)

Also when making claims about the physical world, what the claim represents actually exists. While, when making claims about abstractions, such as numbers, any such existence is absent. Numbers only start representing the phyiscal world when applied to things as either an amount or a ratio, before that they don't describe anything in existence in any way (except thoughts in our heads).

[TheRobin]

 

If the observation device interferes with the wave, how so? It is a recorder set up over both slits to recieve photons that were already there, it is not adding anything to the equation. As for 'know', yes well , like I said it is not being interfered with yet it changes it function, so I can't say it reacts as there is nothing to react to. If you could explain to me how  the recorder device interferes with the wave, I'd appreciate it. Another person recently pointed out to me thtat mathmatical equations are non-physical things that are real.

 

My reasoning was that the "wave" interferes with the device (must, else no measurement takes place), so an equal interference must take place of the device with the "wave". But since you claim to know about the experiment, why don't you tell me how exactly the "wave" is being measured and how much force the wave exercises onto the device (and vice versa).

as for math-equations: please see my other post about my issues with why they aren't "verifiable" in the same sense as claims about physical reality. (No need to repeat myself). And there's a huge difference between the question of whether we can call something "real" or whether we can verifiy it (i.e. proof somehow that it's true outside our heads) (and I asked for giving me something non-phyiscal we can verify not just naming something that we can call real but isn't physical, since that is what you're claiming). 

[RestoringGuy]

 

 

I used the word "real" a bit too loosely here, what I meant was external reality (i.e. everything that doesn't just happen in our heads as thoughts and intangible abstractions, and in regards to gravity: I'd call the movement of stuff very much tangible).

The key difference being, that physical reality can't err while we can err with our thoughts, so giving both the characteristics of being equally proofable or true takes away that important difference imo. Mathematics is proofen by other people agreeing or disagreeing with what is presented. Claims about external realty are proofen if reality behaves that way.
That's why I see there being two different distinct words for each and not just one for both (the word "proof" goes for both, so I don't see the need to use "verify" in the same way and ignore "validate" completely)

Also when making claims about the physical world, what the claim represents actually exists. While, when making claims about abstractions, such as numbers, any such existence is absent. Numbers only start representing the phyiscal world when applied to things as either an amount or a ratio, before that they don't describe anything in existence in any way (except thoughts in our heads).

 

How is gravity movement of stuff that is tangible when we apply the term gravity to stuff far away that we cannot touch and we never will go near?  Does it not seem that we apply a principle that falling objects could be touched and/or measured by some apparatus of our construction subject to careful design and objective criteria?  For example a robotic probe that measures gravity on planet Mars, is it subject to the idea that the people of Earth must momentarily agree that it is beautiful work of art prior to its launch to Mars, or is it subject to the idea that its gravitational sensors are reproducibly objective and reliable?

If we apply the reproducibility and reliability conditions to the probe and gravity, why not use the same conditions for mathematics?  When you say existence of numbers is absent, that is like saying gravity is absent when you don't witness it.  Numbers and gravity both describe the behavior of matter.  Gravitational law is a tool that predicts the curvature of space and the acceleration of let's say a comet.  Numbers are a tool to predict how many particles (or goats or seashells) you will have when you place two and two together.  Both of these things describe what the universe does and how it behaves, and neither thing itself seems tangible.  We say they are real only by looking a physical samples of how well they predict and explain things.  A comet affected by gravity can be moving differently than a straight line, and it is "in our heads" that we extend our notion of gravity to explain such behavior.  But we seem to agree the universe itself behaves this way and our mental idea of gravity corresponds with physical behavior that can be tested and there are experiments that can be reproduced.  In that way gravity is said to be real.  But why discriminate against the objects of mathematics, such as numbers, which also consist of ideas and are similarly useful to explain physical behavior?  It seems to me we extend mathematics to be not just mental, but always subject to at least something physical.

I am not clear on how mathematics is proven by mere agreement with a presentation. An agreement alone is a result that is not reproducible, different people (or the same people) will change their minds and we have no external testing method.  A computer can also generate (and verify) mathematical results.  It seems to me there is more than simple agreement, but a requirement that a deduction is objectively sound.  If a computer is built that discovers and proves a conjecture, and different computers and human pencil-and-paper proofs all confirm the result is inescapable, why should this reproducible result be any less real than the gravity-test results of a probe on Mars?

 

[TheRobin]

I think there's an important distinction to be made when working with such abstractions as numbers. When you apply numbers to things (as in either an amount or a ratio) then they become description of external reality. But if you only work with them as pure abstractions you take away that part and just see how much you can derive from the definition of the axioms.In that sense numbers don't exist, just like "greenness" or "roundness" doesn't exist, unless you apply the abstraction to an actual thing and make it a property of said thing (for instance: green grass, a round table).And numbers also don't describe behaviour. Behaviour is an action and numbers don't describe actions. They can describe the ratio of comparing one action to another (like speed), but they themselves don't describe behaviour."different people (or the same people) will change their minds and we have no external testing method." This about sums up, why I don't see any reason in using the same term "verify" to describe the process of proofing (abstract) mathematics that I already use to describe the proofing of gravity. Because there we do have an external testing method and the result is not dependent on people's minds (as in people's thoughts)

[RestoringGuy]

 

I think there's an important distinction to be made when working with such abstractions as numbers. When you apply numbers to things (as in either an amount or a ratio) then they become description of external reality. But if you only work with them as pure abstractions you take away that part and just see how much you can derive from the definition of the axioms.

In that sense numbers don't exist, just like "greenness" or "roundness" doesn't exist, unless you apply the abstraction to an actual thing and make it a property of said thing (for instance: green grass, a round table).

And numbers also don't describe behaviour. Behaviour is an action and numbers don't describe actions. They can describe the ratio of comparing one action to another (like speed), but they themselves don't describe behaviour.

"different people (or the same people) will change their minds and we have no external testing method." This about sums up, why I don't see any reason in using the same term "verify" to describe the process of proofing (abstract) mathematics that I already use to describe the proofing of gravity. Because there we do have an external testing method and the result is not dependent on people's minds (as in people's thoughts)

 

But you can't "work with" a pure abstraction.  There is always a physical model or artifact during a proof.  I use the word "verify" to say the physical model, even if it is dots of ink on paper, satisfy a verifiable condition -- a thing is objective when my mind doesn't need to be there to do the verification (anybody can do it or even a machine could but it still has to be demonstrated physically).

If you say an abstraction (greenness,etc.) doesn't exist, then what about a term like "dog"?  Could we not say dogs do not exist, as the term may apply to a class of animal (wolf hybrids) that some would say qualifies as dog and some say it does not?  We always turn an abstraction into something physical when verifying a mathematical proof.  Sometimes it is electrical impulses on a computer, and sometimes it is pencil marks.  A number DOES describes behavior, it describes what will happen to that number (and its ink/chalk representation) during the physical act of doing mathematical proof.

 

[James Hodge]

 

 

If the observation device interferes with the wave, how so? It is a recorder set up over both slits to recieve photons that were already there, it is not adding anything to the equation. As for 'know', yes well , like I said it is not being interfered with yet it changes it function, so I can't say it reacts as there is nothing to react to. If you could explain to me how  the recorder device interferes with the wave, I'd appreciate it. Another person recently pointed out to me thtat mathmatical equations are non-physical things that are real.

 

My reasoning was that the "wave" interferes with the device (must, else no measurement takes place), so an equal interference must take place of the device with the "wave". But since you claim to know about the experiment, why don't you tell me how exactly the "wave" is being measured and how much force the wave exercises onto the device (and vice versa).

as for math-equations: please see my other post about my issues with why they aren't "verifiable" in the same sense as claims about physical reality. (No need to repeat myself). And there's a huge difference between the question of whether we can call something "real" or whether we can verifiy it (i.e. proof somehow that it's true outside our heads) (and I asked for giving me something non-phyiscal we can verify not just naming something that we can call real but isn't physical, since that is what you're claiming). 

 

I don't think either of us know enough about that experiment to debate it and I am happy to leave it as it was never really a crux of my argument. My high school physics teacher reckoned no one really knew how gravity works as how does the earth actually know the sun is there? Like wise with two magnets. We know there is a field, but what is a magnetic field made of? And what is a gravitational field made of? Gravity must be non-physical as it can't be weighed or touched.