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On 03/29/10 08:52, Darren New wrote:
> Neeum Zawan wrote:
>> Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible
>> crisp, which no decent human being would eat?
>
> That's a good question. The sort of thing that occurs to me all the
> time, really.
Probably because they're used to toast things other than toast.
--
Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible
crisp, which no decent human being would eat?
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John VanSickle wrote:
> 3) That the world of our experience is the only one.
Well, if there's more than one, and we can't experience it, I'd say it
doesn't particularly matter. What most people mean by that, tho, is that we
*rarely* experience it.
If there's really another world in which God lives, is it actually a
different world if God actively intervenes in ours?
> 4) That the world of our experience has always operated precisely as we
> observe it to operate today.
I don't think science assumes that at all.
> Many things claimed by the non-religious worldview (such as the age of
> the earth) demand that things like the speed of light and the decay rate
> of radioactive isotopes have always had the values we measure them to
> have today.
No they don't. They're measured in different ways and they agree.
> They also demand that no major changes have been forced
> upon the world of our experience by some agency, existing outside of
> that world, at times where we have been unable to make observations.
True. I think there's a general assumption that there isn't a conspiracy to
fool scientific measurements. (What amuses me is when the faithful will
assert that it's their caring and loving god doing to lying.)
> These are no small assumptions. We measure carbon-14 as having a
> half-life of ~5000 years, but our claim that it had the same half-life
> in King Tut's day is not based on observation, but on the assumption
> that some things about nature never change.
This isn't true. You measure things like radioactive decay, and you compare
it against rings in trees, and layers of arctic ice, and the numbers of
generations of animal bones found in tar pits, and they all match up. This
is one set of assumptions scientists don't really make without support. Of
course, it helps that we actually have written records of when the mummies
were mummified and such, as well as things like Oklo.
Certainly it's likely more common in astronomical fields, methinks, simply
because the time frames and distances are far too large to be able to do
more than estimate. All you can do is look at a large amount of pretty much
static data and deduce things from that. For example, some of the hubble
measurements are based on seeing stars in our galaxy behave a particular
way, and stars in the neighboring galaxies behave a particular way, and
assuming that stars too far away for paralax measurements behave the same
way. I'd put that under #2, myself.
> How do we *know* it does
> not change? Not in the same way that we know many other things about
> nature (through observation).
By measuring things a bunch of different ways, then finding the consistencies.
> In a like manner, how do we *know* that our world has operated without
> any interference from any other? To be honest, we don't.
Tautologically. If they interfered, they're part of our world. :-)
> and its effect spill over to where we can see them.
I think that would make it open to scientific investigation. Certainly
that's part of the whole "what caused the big bang" investigation.
> if we cannot assume certain things about the operation of nature
> to be constant (assumptions 3 and 4),
I don't think we assume those things. We check them.
> It is not easy to admit that we, in conducting science, have made
> assumptions that we have no hope of proving;
I think we can certainly disprove that (for example) humans are at the
middle of the universe or that evil spirits interfere in our measurements.
(For example, all we need is Satan to appear and admit it.)
I'm thinking that most of the BS that religious people try to argue
scientifically (like transitional fossils, or carbon dating, or etc) are
easy to "prove" in a scientific way without assuming the universe has always
operated under the same approximate set of laws. But I do think there are a
number of unprovable assumptions (like that that set of laws is in theory
discoverable) that don't discredit science but rather power it.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Yes, we're traveling together,
but to different destinations.
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John VanSickle wrote:
> 3) That the world of our experience is the only one.
Actually, I think the whole "string theory" bits and "brane" bits are an
investigation of exactly this. So I don't think this is a fundamental
assumption.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Yes, we're traveling together,
but to different destinations.
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andrel wrote:
> On 28-3-2010 19:50, Darren New wrote:
>> Argumentative religious people often seem to comment that science
>> requires faith. Argumentative non-religious people say that's
>> nonsense, since there is evidence. I contend that there are at least
>> two things most scientists take on faith, without supporting evidence:
>>
>> 2) Humans aren't special.
>
> I think there is evidence for that. Almost nothing in modern medicine or
> biology makes sense if we were special.
How about the fact that the stars of the universe are all red-shifted the
farther they get from *us*? Or the fact that we seem to be the only
creatures in the entire *universe* that broadcast radio signals?
(I don't necessarily mean "special" in terms of biology-on-earth, but
special in a more universal sense.)
People don't say "the red shift shows everything is moving away from us" or
"humans happen to live where time passes fastest in the universe." They say
"the red shift shows everything is moving away from everything else."
(Actually, now that I think about it, "humans happen to live at the top of
the universe where time passes fastest" completely explains *both* those
bits of evidence. :-)
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Yes, we're traveling together,
but to different destinations.
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Darren New wrote:
> I think we can certainly disprove that (for example) humans are at the
> middle of the universe or that evil spirits interfere in our
> measurements. (For example, all we need is Satan to appear and admit it.)
But, since any point of reference can only see outward, in the universe,
as far as light could travel since the beginning of the universe . . .
We are all at the center of it.
I really shouldn't try thinking like this, this late/early in the morning.
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On 30-3-2010 0:30, Darren New wrote:
> andrel wrote:
>> On 28-3-2010 19:50, Darren New wrote:
>>> Argumentative religious people often seem to comment that science
>>> requires faith. Argumentative non-religious people say that's
>>> nonsense, since there is evidence. I contend that there are at least
>>> two things most scientists take on faith, without supporting evidence:
>>>
>>> 2) Humans aren't special.
>>
>> I think there is evidence for that. Almost nothing in modern medicine
>> or biology makes sense if we were special.
>
> How about the fact that the stars of the universe are all red-shifted
> the farther they get from *us*? Or the fact that we seem to be the only
> creatures in the entire *universe* that broadcast radio signals?
For the latter see the Drake equation.
> (I don't necessarily mean "special" in terms of biology-on-earth, but
> special in a more universal sense.)
>
> People don't say "the red shift shows everything is moving away from us"
> or "humans happen to live where time passes fastest in the universe."
> They say "the red shift shows everything is moving away from everything
> else."
We say that because we believe in Lorentz invariance.
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> How about the fact that the stars of the universe are all red-shifted the
> farther they get from *us*?
Once you have the information about the surrounding stars, isn't it quite
trivial to show that from the point of view of *any* star, all other stars
are red-shifted more the further away they are?
> Or the fact that we seem to be the only creatures in the entire *universe*
> that broadcast radio signals?
Why the assumption that any intelligent lifeform would be broadcasting radio
signals for any significant time in its existence? To me that seems silly.
Earth has been broadcasting radio for 100 years out of 4.5 billion, maybe we
will continue to do so for another 10000 years until we find something
better? Those timescales are tiny compared to the variation in ages of
other stars.
Also, really can you detect the radio signals from Earth more than a few
light years away? Isn't the signal going to be incredibly tiny and
virtually impossible to detect? And that's just a few light years, what
about the other planets billions of light years away?
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Darren New wrote:
> John VanSickle wrote:
>> Many things claimed by the non-religious worldview (such as the age of
>> the earth) demand that things like the speed of light and the decay
>> rate of radioactive isotopes have always had the values we measure
>> them to have today.
>
> No they don't. They're measured in different ways and they agree.
Although if the values for these constants are in fact the result of
more fundamental properties of space and matter, then any shift in one
could only happen with a corresponding shift in the others (for
instance, the electric constant, the magnetic constant, and the speed of
light, are all interrelated), and our benchmark is moving.
>> They also demand that no major changes have been forced upon the world
>> of our experience by some agency, existing outside of that world, at
>> times where we have been unable to make observations.
>
> True. I think there's a general assumption that there isn't a conspiracy
> to fool scientific measurements. (What amuses me is when the faithful
> will assert that it's their caring and loving god doing to lying.)
It's a fair assumption to state that if miracles were happening in the
world, science would be rather hobbled in its progress. If a Supreme
Being wanted science to progress at the fastest possible rate, He would
refrain from causing miracles.
Which means that the lack of miracles proves nothing...
Regards,
John
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On 30-3-2010 13:46, scott wrote:
>> How about the fact that the stars of the universe are all red-shifted
>> the farther they get from *us*?
>
> Once you have the information about the surrounding stars, isn't it
> quite trivial to show that from the point of view of *any* star, all
> other stars are red-shifted more the further away they are?
>
>> Or the fact that we seem to be the only creatures in the entire
>> *universe* that broadcast radio signals?
>
> Why the assumption that any intelligent lifeform would be broadcasting
> radio signals for any significant time in its existence? To me that
> seems silly. Earth has been broadcasting radio for 100 years out of 4.5
> billion, maybe we will continue to do so for another 10000 years until
> we find something better?
50 or 100 is a better estimate. We are already shutting down the
Megawatt analog radio and TV transmission towers. Transmitters are
continuously moving to less output and wider spectrum. Total power
transmitted to outer space is decreasing and becoming less recognizable.
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Sabrina Kilian wrote:
> Darren New wrote:
>> I think we can certainly disprove that (for example) humans are at the
>> middle of the universe or that evil spirits interfere in our
>> measurements. (For example, all we need is Satan to appear and admit it.)
>
> But, since any point of reference can only see outward, in the universe,
> as far as light could travel since the beginning of the universe . . .
That's already assuming that everywhere in the universe is homogenous. E.g.,
if we see a galaxy to the north that is halfway to the "edge" of the
universe, you're assuming that if someone in that galaxy looked north, the
"edge" of the universe would be the same distance away, rather than much
closer.
I've seen discussions about the density of galaxies at distances, and how
they don't match what you'd expect if the universe was expanding. But they
do match what you'd expect if the universe was homogenous on a 4-sphere (or
maybe a 5-sphere?) and time was simply running slower farther away because
the normals weren't parallel. I.e., nothing's moving. It's just going slower
from our point of view because it's closer to the horizon as seen by us. Of
course, that's still homogenous, but does it really need to be?
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Yes, we're traveling together,
but to different destinations.
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