On Thu, Oct 23, 2014 at 3:50 AM, Peter Sas <[email protected]> wrote:
> Well, I'm not a physicists but a philosopher, so I cannot give a > physicist's answer. My approach is to start with the most fundamental > question (Why is there anything at all?) and then see how far we can get > with pure logic alone. It is of course very, very tricky to try to derive > fundamental laws of nature in this way. But I think that we can actually > get quite far with such an a priori method. Now with respect to your > question, I understand that dark energy is a basically repulsive force > driving inflation. I don't want to say I can derive dark energy from a > priori principles (that would be absurd). But I think I can derive a > duality of attraction and repulsion in that way. The reasoning I emply, > however, is very abstract, using ideas taken from philosophers like Hegel > and Heidegger, although on the whole I feel more attracted to the > rationality of Anglo-American philosophy (and science) than to postmodern > philosophy (which I think is basically a fraud). Perhaps my reasoning is > closest to German idealists like Hegel and Schelling who still feld they > could derive the basic principles of natural science from philosophical > principles. So here is how my argument goes in nuce, I hope you can make > sense of it: > > First I argue that nothing is self-negating (for logical arguments see the > blog piece). Simply put: nothing is nothing to such a degree that it isn't > even itself! Thus, as nothing negates itself, it produces being, it becomes > something. Now, since nothing is different from itself, being (as the > negation of nothing) must be different from something else. This then is > how I define being: as difference from something else. Now it is easy to > see that this difference must take two forms. First, being is being because > it differs from non-being or nothing (let's call this ontological > difference, following Heidegger). Second, being must also be internally > differentiated, that is to say: there must be multiple beings differing > from each other (let's call this ontic difference). Then we can say: a > being is what it is because of its ontic difference from other beings. > (Ultimately, I think, this imlies that beings are mathematical, for lacking > intrinsic qualities of their own, they canly be distinguished in > quantitative ways, such that it is their position in a quantitative > structure which determines what they are.) Now we can say: the source (or > cause) of what beings are is (ontic) difference. This difference, then, > must precede them, just as any origin must precede the originated (at least > logically, if not temporally). But what is this difference that precedes > the different beings? It's like a relation that generates its own relata. > Thus we must postulate something like a pure difference or a pure > negativity underlying the mutual non-identity of beings. But what is this > pure negativity? It seems clear to me that we are now back with our > starting point, the concept of nothing as differing from itself. And this > is not surprising if the self-negating nothing generates all beings, for > then it must also act as the pure negativity that differentiates beings. > But now comes the rub: there is a contradiction between ontological and > ontic difference. Recall: ontological difference requires that beings > differ from nothing (i.e. pure negativity), whereas ontic difference > requires that there is pure negativity between them. Hence: to have > existence (i.e. ontological difference) beings must stand in a negative > relation to the negativity between them, they must differ from their mutual > difference. But to differ from their mutual difference, beings must become > the same and loose their separate identities. Hence there is a > contradiction between identity and existence, i.e. between the determinacy > of beings (ontic difference) and their existence (ontological difference): > in short, existence is unifying, determinacy is separating. Now given the > fact that being must be logically consistent, we must interpret this > contradiction not as logical but as an opposition of forces. Thus existence > becomes a unifying force, determinacy (ontic difference) becomes a > separating force. The separating force must manifest itself as repulsion, > i.e. as resistance against unification. The unifying force must manifest > itself as resistance against repulsion, i.e. as attraction. Hence repulsion > and attraction are the basic forces that govern being. > > I spelled out this argument in more detail on another blog piece I wrote: > > So if you want more detail, please check this piece. I have to emphasize, > however, that I am still working on these ideas and that I hope to publish > a fuller account on my blog in the near future. > http://critique-of-pure > <http://critique-of-pure-interest.blogspot.nl/2014/06/theses-towards-dialectical-ontology_8246.html> > -interest.blogspot.nl/2014/06/theses-towards-dialectical-ontology_8246.html > <http://critique-of-pure-interest.blogspot.nl/2014/06/theses-towards-dialectical-ontology_8246.html> > . > > Actually Peter I was thinking more about your basic assumption that mass-energy is balanced by gravity, one being the negative of the other, which also seems to apply to the dialectic explained in the second blog above, which I just read. Dark energy creates more space and perhaps spacetime. Space or spacetime does not appear to be the negative of anything. Rather like a particle and an anti-particle annihilating each other to produce light, if the dielectic is correct for Dark Energy, then there must be a balance of positive and negative to create space. Yet the creation of space just creates more Dark Energy along with it. The leading candidate for the explanation of Dark Energy is the cosmological constant which amounts to a repulsive force. But space or space time is neutral with respect to force and there is apparently no evidence that an attractive force like gravity due to matter creation is happening. Someone on this list like Brent or John Clark will surely correct my explanation if it is wrong. But in short, Dark Energy appears to falsify the notion that something is derived from nothing by a balance of forces. BTW there some preliminary evidence that the cosmological constant explanation is not correct: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/dark-energy-cosmological-constant/ Richard > > > Op woensdag 22 oktober 2014 15:46:16 UTC+2 schreef yanniru: >> >> Peter, >> >> Could you elaborate on how Dark Energy fits into your thesis? >> Richard >> >> On Wed, Oct 22, 2014 at 4:33 AM, Peter Sas <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> Hi guys, >>> >>> Here is a blog piece I wrote about nothing as the ultimate source of >>> being: >>> >>> http://critique-of-pure-interest.blogspot.nl/2014/09/ >>> why-is-there-something-rather-than.html >>> >>> -- >>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >>> Groups "Everything List" group. >>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send >>> an email to [email protected]. >>> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >>> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. >>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >>> >> >> -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
