Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Wed, May 9, 2012 at 9:26 PM, John Mikes  wrote:

> Ricardo: I hate to become a nothingologist, but if you REMOVE things to
> make NOTHING you still have the remnanat (empty space, hole, potential of
> 'it' having been there or whatever) from WHERE you removed it. IMO in
> Nothing there is not even a "where" identified.
>

But the space gets removed too ... I'm not sure if I understand you.

Ricardo.


>  Forgive me the 'light' reply, please.
> John M
>
> On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 5:17 PM, R AM  wrote:
>
>>
>>
>>  On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 9:46 PM, John Mikes  wrote:
>>
>>> Ricardo:
>>> good text! I may add to it:
>>> "Who created Nothing? - of course: Nobody". (The ancient joke of
>>> Odysseus towards Polyphemos: 'Nobody' has hurt me).
>>>
>>> Just one thing: if it contains (includes) EMPTY SPACE, it includes
>>> space, it is not nothing.
>>>
>>
>> I actually meant that most of the time, people say "nothing" when they
>> mean Newtonian empty space. I agree that "nothing" is not empty space.
>>
>>
>>> And please, do not forget about my adage in the previous post that
>>> limits (borders) are similarly not includable into nothing, so it must be
>>> an infinite - well - "nothing".
>>> It still may contain things we have no knowledge about and in such case
>>> it is NOT nothing. We just are ignorant.
>>>
>>
>> I agree that if it contains things, then it is not "nothing", but you can
>> "create" a "nothing" by removing them.
>>
>> Ricardo.
>>
>>
>>> JM
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 1:06 PM, R AM  wrote:
>>>
 Some thoughts about "nothing":

 - If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a
 property, then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the
 limitation of generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come from
 "nothing".

 - Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists
 (obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.
 Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
 possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.

 - Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based on
 the intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas
 "something" requires an explanation. However, given that the possibility of
 something existing is necessarily true, an explanation would be required
 for why there is "nothing" instead of "something".

 - There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
 existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)

 - I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation than
 the universe we observe is based on a generalization of the idea of
 classical empty space. However, this intuition is based on what we know
 about *this* universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than things existing in
 it). But why this intuition about *our* reality should be extrapolated to
 metaphysics?

 - I think that the important question is why this universe instead of
 any other universe? (including "nothing").

 Ricardo.

 On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 6:24 PM, John Clark wrote:

> On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:
>
>  > Is it so hard to understand a "word"?
>>
>
> Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years
> ago "nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a few
> years later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any energy too,
> then still later it meant also not having space, and then it meant not 
> even
> having time. Something that is lacking matter energy time and space may 
> not
> be the purest form of nothing but it is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful
> "thing", and if science can explain (and someday it very well may be able
> to) how our world with all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such
> modest beginnings then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such
> activities "incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.
>
>
>
>> *>** N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential
>>
>
> Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious and
> extremely dull answer.
>
>  > I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
>>  "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
>>  And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
>>  It turned into Somethingness
>>
>
> Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce
> something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which is
> something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.
>
>   John K Clark
>
>
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> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
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> To pos

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Wed, May 9, 2012 at 8:23 PM, Bruno Marchal  wrote:

>
> On 09 May 2012, at 17:09, R AM wrote:
>
>
> "nothing" could also be obtained by removing the curly brackets from the
> empty set {}.
>
>
> N... Some bit of blank remains. If it was written on hemp, you could
> smoke it. That's not nothing!
>
> Don't confuse the notion and the symbols used to point to the notion.
> Which you did, inadvertently I guess.
>

I was using the analogy between items contained in sets and things
contained in bags. The curly brackets would represent the bags. Removing
things from a bag leaves it empty. Removing the bag leaves ... nothing.

Sure, like 0 is some sort of nothing in Number theory, and like quantum
> vacuum is some sort of nothing in QM. Nothing is a theory dependent notion.
> (Not so for the notion of computable functions).
>

Yes, these concrete nothings are well behaved, unlike the absolute nothing,
which we don't know what rules it obey (in case it is a meaningful concept,
which it might not be).



> Extensionally, the UD is a function from nothing (no inputs) to nothing
> (no outputs), but then what a worker!
>
> Extensionally it belongs to { } ^ { }. It is a function from { } to { }.
>

But I guess that is because the UD generates internally all possible inputs
for all possible programs, isn't it.

Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Mikes]

Ricardo: I hate to become a nothingologist, but if you REMOVE things to
make NOTHING you still have the remnanat (empty space, hole, potential of
'it' having been there or whatever) from WHERE you removed it. IMO in
Nothing there is not even a "where" identified.
Forgive me the 'light' reply, please.
John M

On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 5:17 PM, R AM  wrote:

>
>
>  On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 9:46 PM, John Mikes  wrote:
>
>> Ricardo:
>> good text! I may add to it:
>> "Who created Nothing? - of course: Nobody". (The ancient joke of Odysseus
>> towards Polyphemos: 'Nobody' has hurt me).
>>
>> Just one thing: if it contains (includes) EMPTY SPACE, it includes space,
>> it is not nothing.
>>
>
> I actually meant that most of the time, people say "nothing" when they
> mean Newtonian empty space. I agree that "nothing" is not empty space.
>
>
>> And please, do not forget about my adage in the previous post that limits
>> (borders) are similarly not includable into nothing, so it must be an
>> infinite - well - "nothing".
>> It still may contain things we have no knowledge about and in such case
>> it is NOT nothing. We just are ignorant.
>>
>
> I agree that if it contains things, then it is not "nothing", but you can
> "create" a "nothing" by removing them.
>
> Ricardo.
>
>
>> JM
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 1:06 PM, R AM  wrote:
>>
>>> Some thoughts about "nothing":
>>>
>>> - If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a
>>> property, then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the
>>> limitation of generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come from
>>> "nothing".
>>>
>>> - Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists
>>> (obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.
>>> Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
>>> possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.
>>>
>>> - Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based on
>>> the intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas
>>> "something" requires an explanation. However, given that the possibility of
>>> something existing is necessarily true, an explanation would be required
>>> for why there is "nothing" instead of "something".
>>>
>>> - There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
>>> existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)
>>>
>>> - I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation than
>>> the universe we observe is based on a generalization of the idea of
>>> classical empty space. However, this intuition is based on what we know
>>> about *this* universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than things existing in
>>> it). But why this intuition about *our* reality should be extrapolated to
>>> metaphysics?
>>>
>>> - I think that the important question is why this universe instead of
>>> any other universe? (including "nothing").
>>>
>>> Ricardo.
>>>
>>> On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 6:24 PM, John Clark  wrote:
>>>
 On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:

  > Is it so hard to understand a "word"?
>

 Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years ago
 "nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a few years
 later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any energy too, then
 still later it meant also not having space, and then it meant not even
 having time. Something that is lacking matter energy time and space may not
 be the purest form of nothing but it is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful
 "thing", and if science can explain (and someday it very well may be able
 to) how our world with all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such
 modest beginnings then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such
 activities "incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.



> *>** N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential
>

 Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious and
 extremely dull answer.

  > I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
>  "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
>  And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
>  It turned into Somethingness
>

 Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce
 something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which is
 something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.

   John K Clark


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>>>

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 09 May 2012, at 17:09, R AM wrote:


PM, Bruno Marchal


Yes.
"Nothing", in set theory, would be more like an empty *collection*  
of sets, or an empty "universe" (a model of set theory), except that  
in first order logic we forbid empty models (so that AxP(x) ->  
ExP(x) remains valid, to simplify life (proofs)).


"nothing" could also be obtained by removing the curly brackets from  
the empty set {}.


N... Some bit of blank remains. If it was written on hemp, you  
could smoke it. That's not nothing!


Don't confuse the notion and the symbols used to point to the notion.  
Which you did, inadvertently I guess.


{ } is a set and "{ }" is a string with 3 symbols, ... which should be  
differentiated even from the paper and ink, or stable picture on a  
screen, representing physically the symbols to you, and then from the  
image made by your brain, and the neuronal 'music' trigged by it, and  
the consciousness filtered locally by the process, etc.



Or removing the (empty) container. I guess this would be equivalent  
to "removing" space from the universe. Except that this doesn't make  
any sense in Set Theory (maybe it doesn't make any sense in reality  
either).


Still, {} is some sort of nothing in Set Theory,


Sure, like 0 is some sort of nothing in Number theory, and like  
quantum vacuum is some sort of nothing in QM. Nothing is a theory  
dependent notion. (Not so for the notion of computable functions).


Extensionally, the UD is a function from nothing (no inputs) to  
nothing (no outputs), but then what a worker!


Extensionally it belongs to { } ^ { }. It is a function from { } to { }.

But that is a bit trivial, I think. It is due to the fact that  
computability theory is not dimensional. Dimensions also have to be  
derived from the internal points of view (with comp), like the real  
and complex numbers and the physical laws.




given that it is what is left after all that is allowed to be  
removed, is removed.


OK.

Bruno





Ricardo.


Bruno

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

>
> PM, Bruno Marchal
>
> Yes.
> "Nothing", in set theory, would be more like an empty *collection* of
> sets, or an empty "universe" (a model of set theory), except that in first
> order logic we forbid empty models (so that AxP(x) -> ExP(x) remains valid,
> to simplify life (proofs)).
>

"nothing" could also be obtained by removing the curly brackets from the
empty set {}. Or removing the (empty) container. I guess this would be
equivalent to "removing" space from the universe. Except that this doesn't
make any sense in Set Theory (maybe it doesn't make any sense in reality
either).

Still, {} is some sort of nothing in Set Theory, given that it is what is
left after all that is allowed to be removed, is removed.

Ricardo.



> Bruno
>
> http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/
>
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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 09 May 2012, at 13:19, R AM wrote:

On Wed, May 9, 2012 at 12:48 PM, Bruno Marchal   
wrote:
The empty set is the absence of elements (nothing) in that set. It  
is the set { }.
The empty set is not nothing. For example, the set is { { } } is not  
empty. It contains as element the empty set.

Just to be precise.

Well, I guess that the empty set is more like an empty box.


Yes.
"Nothing", in set theory, would be more like an empty *collection* of  
sets, or an empty "universe" (a model of set theory), except that in  
first order logic we forbid empty models (so that AxP(x) -> ExP(x)  
remains valid, to simplify life (proofs)).


Bruno

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Wed, May 9, 2012 at 12:48 PM, Bruno Marchal  wrote:

> The empty set is the absence of elements (nothing) in that set. It is the
> set { }.
> The empty set is not nothing. For example, the set is { { } } is not
> empty. It contains as element the empty set.
> Just to be precise.
>

Well, I guess that the empty set is more like an empty box.

Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 09 May 2012, at 12:36, R AM wrote:




On Wed, May 9, 2012 at 2:25 AM, Pierz  wrote:

You must have misread me. I am anything but sure nothing must have  
come before.


Yes, probably I did.

Indeed, my whole point is that something from nothing - genuine  
nothing - is a nonsense. You can't bridge the hgap between existence  
and non existence by any causal process. I think that's obvious, and  
we must accept that the universe simply 'is'.


I agree.

An empty set is not the absence of a set.

A set is a collection of elements and the empty set is the absence  
of elements (nothing).


The empty set is the absence of elements (nothing) in that set. It is  
the set { }.
The empty set is not nothing. For example, the set is { { } } is not  
empty. It contains as element the empty set.

Just to be precise.



But to take another angle on it: consider what you mean by removing  
these objects. It's merely something you're imagining, it does not  
correspond to any real process. In reality, energy and matter  
transform, they are not created or destroyed.


I agree, it is not a physical process. But I am not proposing this  
combinatorics as a way to create something from nothing, but just to  
show that there are more ways of being than of non-being. In fact,  
it is not that different of saying that the laws of this universe  
are "unlikely" (given that many more are possible). But it is all  
combinatorics.


You say existence is more "likely" than nonexistence based on this  
imaginary subtraction/addition, but think about the meaning of  
"likely". What is the set you're sampling from? All possible states  
of existence including the absence of anything - the empty set. So  
you've already 'created' the universe of universes as it were. Why  
is there a set to sample from to allow there to be any likelihood of  
one or the other state of being? That is the crux of the issue.


Well, I have not really "created" this set of possibilities, have I?  
The possibilities are out there, so to speak. I cannot even imagine  
how to make them go away, so to speak. I mean, I can imagine my home  
does not exist, but I cannot imagine the absence of the possibility  
of my home.


OK, let's try another angle. People in this list have infinite  
universes for breakfast. To me, the most important problem of  
multiverses is that most universes in them are random (white  
rabbits). But it is not usually appreciated that very vew of them  
correspond to Newtonian empty space. In fact, the multiverse already  
explains why there is something rather than empty space (at the cost  
of white rabbits). I agree that Newtonian empty space is not  
nothing, but the argument that I have used is very similar, and  
classic empty space is what most people mean by "nothing" anyway.


Ricardo.


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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Wed, May 9, 2012 at 2:25 AM, Pierz  wrote:

>
> You must have misread me. I am anything but sure nothing must have come
> before.


Yes, probably I did.


> Indeed, my whole point is that something from nothing - genuine nothing -
> is a nonsense. You can't bridge the hgap between existence and non
> existence by any causal process. I think that's obvious, and we must accept
> that the universe simply 'is'.


I agree.


> An empty set is not the absence of a set.


A set is a collection of elements and the empty set is the absence of
elements (nothing).


> But to take another angle on it: consider what you mean by removing these
> objects. It's merely something you're imagining, it does not correspond to
> any real process. In reality, energy and matter transform, they are not
> created or destroyed.


I agree, it is not a physical process. But I am not proposing this
combinatorics as a way to create something from nothing, but just to show
that there are more ways of being than of non-being. In fact, it is not
that different of saying that the laws of this universe are "unlikely"
(given that many more are possible). But it is all combinatorics.


> You say existence is more "likely" than nonexistence based on this
> imaginary subtraction/addition, but think about the meaning of "likely".
> What is the set you're sampling from? All possible states of existence
> including the absence of anything - the empty set. So you've already
> 'created' the universe of universes as it were. Why is there a set to
> sample from to allow there to be any likelihood of one or the other state
> of being? That is the crux of the issue.
>

Well, I have not really "created" this set of possibilities, have I? The
possibilities are out there, so to speak. I cannot even imagine how to make
them go away, so to speak. I mean, I can imagine my home does not exist,
but I cannot imagine the absence of the possibility of my home.

OK, let's try another angle. People in this list have infinite universes
for breakfast. To me, the most important problem of multiverses is that
most universes in them are random (white rabbits). But it is not usually
appreciated that very vew of them correspond to Newtonian empty space. In
fact, the multiverse already explains why there is something rather than
empty space (at the cost of white rabbits). I agree that Newtonian empty
space is not nothing, but the argument that I have used is very similar,
and classic empty space is what most people mean by "nothing" anyway.

Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 09 May 2012, at 02:36, Pierz wrote:



The problem is that physicists have not yet succeed in marrying QM  
and GR, which is needed to get a quantum theory of space-time. You  
can bet on strings or on loop gravity though, or on the Dewitt- 
Wheeler equation, which, actually make physical time vanishing  
completely from the big picture. It is an internal parameter only.


Yes, none of which I pretend to understand any more than any guy who  
reads all the popular expositions of such theories. But it seems  
highly dubious to me for Krauss to even present a theory that  
pretends to explain something as fundamental as something from  
nothing given the absence of a QM-GR unification. After all, as good  
as QM and GR are at predicting stuff in their domains, we know that  
neither is right! It's an overreach.


It is different for the UD. Its existence is a theorem in any theory  
of everything, like this one:


classical logic +
0 ≠ s(x)
s(x) = s(y) -> x = y
x+0 = x
x+s(y) = s(x+y)
x*0=0
x*s(y)=(x*y)+x

or in this one:

Kxy = x
Sxyz = xz(yz)

Yeah OK fine, so maybe I'm one turtle too high! Let's just say  
arithemetic then. Why does it exist? Because.


In this case, we can explain and prove that we cannot explain them  
from less. You provably need some understanding of the numbers to get  
them. Some people thought we can explain or derive natural numbers  
from logic, but this has failed, and eventually we can use logic to  
explain that no theory which does not assume the numbers (or something  
equivalent) can derive the numbers.


To be sure, you can derive the numlbers from Kxy = x and Sxyz =  
xz(yz), like you can derive the axiom of arithmetic (0≠s(x), ...)  
from Kxy = x and Sxyz = xz(yz). They are equivalent (at some  
ontological level).


This makes arithmetic (or Turing equivalent) a nice starting place. In  
that case you can derive at least all dreams, and without them, you  
can derive none of them.


So in that case, you are provably right. Why does number exists?  
because ... if they don't exist you would not been able to ask that  
question. And why do you ask?

Numbers are truly mysterious. Provably mysterious.

This is not entirely obvious. At first sight, it looks like numbers  
are logical, but that intuition is false.


Bruno

PS. You might try to make better quotes.






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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 09 May 2012, at 02:25, Pierz wrote:




There is an interesting point here, although probably not what you  
intended. What you say is true, you cannot trace it all the way  
back to absolute nothing, >because there is no reverse physical  
process that transforms something into "nothing" (at least, not  
into absolute nothing). Or equivalently, there is no physical  
>process that transforms "absolute nothing" into something. But if  
that is the case, why are you so sure that "nothing" must have come  
before?


You must have misread me. I am anything but sure nothing must have  
come before. Indeed, my whole point is that something from nothing -  
genuine nothing - is a nonsense. You can't bridge the hgap between  
existence and non existence by any causal process. I think that's  
obvious, and we must accept that the universe simply 'is'.


We must accept that we have to assume something exist. Not necessarily  
a (physical) universe. With comp there is no physical universe, but we  
can explain why we believe in it from numbers. But we have to assume  
numbers, which are not "nothing".
In all case, we need to assume some basic theory, and it starts from  
some basic bet on a reality.






As for the remark about nothingness having only one way of being  
and there being a lot more ways of existing, it's cute, but it's  
sophistry. Non-being is not a >>countable way of being. It's the  
absence of being - obviously - so can't be presented as one among  
a myriad of possible configurations of the universe.


I agree "nothing" is not a configuration of things, but I think it  
could be considered as one element belonging to an abstract space.  
Let's consider this universe and >the abstract operation of  
removing things. We can remove the Sun, Andromeda, etc. "Nothing"  
is what is left after removing all things (including space,  
time, ...). >It's one among many. It's not that different from 0  
being a natural number or the empty set being a set.


An empty set is not the absence of a set. But to take another angle  
on it: consider what you mean by removing these objects. It's merely  
something you're imagining, it does not correspond to any real  
process. In reality, energy and matter transform, they are not  
created or destroyed. You can't simply imagine subtracting one  
universe from the universe and getting nothing then say, "See, I can  
get nothing from a universe by subtracting it from itself, so I can  
get a universe from nothing by adding it back in"! You're just  
creating some imagined bridge between non-existence and existence  
when that is in fact the whole point of the dilemma. You say  
existence is more "likely" than nonexistence based on this imaginary  
subtraction/addition, but think about the meaning of "likely". What  
is the set you're sampling from? All possible states of existence  
including the absence of anything - the empty set. So you've already  
'created' the universe of universes as it were. Why is there a set  
to sample from to allow there to be any likelihood of one or the  
other state of being? That is the crux of the issue.


There are different way to generate every sets from the empty set,  
like taking its unary intersection in classical logic, or by using the  
reflexion schema. In all case, the nothing is in the mind of some  
"observer' or 'thinker'. Oh, surely God can create some thing from  
nothing, but then you need a God, which can hardly be 'nothing', in  
that case.


Bruno






Ricardo.


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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 08 May 2012, at 21:46, John Mikes wrote:


Ricardo:
good text! I may add to it:
"Who created Nothing? - of course: Nobody". (The ancient joke of  
Odysseus towards Polyphemos: 'Nobody' has hurt me).


Just one thing: if it contains (includes) EMPTY SPACE, it includes  
space, it is not nothing. And please, do not forget about my adage  
in the previous post that limits (borders) are similarly not  
includable into nothing, so it must be an infinite - well - "nothing".
It still may contain things we have no knowledge about and in such  
case it is NOT nothing. We just are ignorant.



Also, I can make a critic to 'nothing' or 'everything' similar to my  
critics of how Stephen use the term "existence". It is a word, and it  
can belong to a theory only if there is an axiomatic for it, or a semi- 
axiomatic. You have to be able to give some sense of some "thing" to  
define or point on "no-thing". At the metalevel, nothing and  
everything are coextensive.


Bruno






JM



On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 1:06 PM, R AM  wrote:
Some thoughts about "nothing":

- If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a  
property, then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the  
limitation of generating "something". Therefore, "something" may  
come from "nothing".


- Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists  
(obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.  
Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing  
with the possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.


- Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based  
on the intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation,  
whereas "something" requires an explanation. However, given that the  
possibility of something existing is necessarily true, an  
explanation would be required for why there is "nothing" instead of  
"something".


- There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing  
existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)


- I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation  
than the universe we observe is based on a generalization of the  
idea of classical empty space. However, this intuition is based on  
what we know about *this* universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than  
things existing in it). But why this intuition about *our* reality  
should be extrapolated to metaphysics?


- I think that the important question is why this universe instead  
of any other universe? (including "nothing").


Ricardo.

On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 6:24 PM, John Clark   
wrote:

On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:

> Is it so hard to understand a "word"?

Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years  
ago "nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a  
few years later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any  
energy too, then still later it meant also not having space, and  
then it meant not even having time. Something that is lacking matter  
energy time and space may not be the purest form of nothing but it  
is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful "thing", and if science can  
explain (and someday it very well may be able to) how our world with  
all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such modest beginnings  
then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such activities  
"incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.


> N O T H I N G  -  is not a set of anything, no potential

Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious  
and extremely dull answer.


> I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
 "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
 And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
 It turned into Somethingness

Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce  
something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which  
is something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.


  John K Clark



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 8, 8:36 pm, Pierz  wrote:

> Yeah OK fine, so maybe I'm one turtle too high! Let's just say arithemetic 
> then. Why does it exist? Because.

Try it this way instead: Why does existence have causality? To make
more sense.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Pierz]

The problem is that physicists have not yet succeed in marrying QM and GR, 
which is needed to get a quantum theory of space-time. You can bet on strings 
or on loop gravity though, or on the Dewitt-Wheeler equation, which, actually 
make physical time vanishing completely from the big picture. It is an internal 
parameter only.

Yes, none of which I pretend to understand any more than any guy who reads all 
the popular expositions of such theories. But it seems highly dubious to me for 
Krauss to even present a theory that pretends to explain something as 
fundamental as something from nothing given the absence of a QM-GR unification. 
After all, as good as QM and GR are at predicting stuff in their domains, we 
know that neither is right! It's an overreach. 

It is different for the UD. Its existence is a theorem in any theory of 
everything, like this one:

classical logic +
0 ≠ s(x)
s(x) = s(y) -> x = y
x+0 = x
x+s(y) = s(x+y)
x*0=0
x*s(y)=(x*y)+x

or in this one:

Kxy = x
Sxyz = xz(yz)

Yeah OK fine, so maybe I'm one turtle too high! Let's just say arithemetic 
then. Why does it exist? Because.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Pierz]

>There is an interesting point here, although probably not what you intended. 
>What you say is true, you cannot trace it all the way back to absolute 
>nothing, >because there is no reverse physical process that transforms 
>something into "nothing" (at least, not into absolute nothing). Or 
>equivalently, there is no physical >process that transforms "absolute nothing" 
>into something. But if that is the case, why are you so sure that "nothing" 
>must have come before?

You must have misread me. I am anything but sure nothing must have come before. 
Indeed, my whole point is that something from nothing - genuine nothing - is a 
nonsense. You can't bridge the hgap between existence and non existence by any 
causal process. I think that's obvious, and we must accept that the universe 
simply 'is'.

>>As for the remark about nothingness having only one way of being and there 
>>being a lot more ways of existing, it's cute, but it's sophistry. Non-being 
>>is not a >>countable way of being. It's the absence of being - obviously - so 
>>can't be presented as one among a myriad of possible configurations of the 
>>universe.

>I agree "nothing" is not a configuration of things, but I think it could be 
>considered as one element belonging to an abstract space. Let's consider this 
>universe and >the abstract operation of removing things. We can remove the 
>Sun, Andromeda, etc. "Nothing" is what is left after removing all things 
>(including space, time, ...). >It's one among many. It's not that different 
>from 0 being a natural number or the empty set being a set.
 
An empty set is not the absence of a set. But to take another angle on it: 
consider what you mean by removing these objects. It's merely something you're 
imagining, it does not correspond to any real process. In reality, energy and 
matter transform, they are not created or destroyed. You can't simply imagine 
subtracting one universe from the universe and getting nothing then say, "See, 
I can get nothing from a universe by subtracting it from itself, so I can get a 
universe from nothing by adding it back in"! You're just creating some imagined 
bridge between non-existence and existence when that is in fact the whole point 
of the dilemma. You say existence is more "likely" than nonexistence based on 
this imaginary subtraction/addition, but think about the meaning of "likely". 
What is the set you're sampling from? All possible states of existence 
including the absence of anything - the empty set. So you've already 'created' 
the universe of universes as it were. Why is there a set to sample from to 
allow there to be any likelihood of one or the other state of being? That is 
the crux of the issue.

>Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 9:46 PM, John Mikes  wrote:

> Ricardo:
> good text! I may add to it:
> "Who created Nothing? - of course: Nobody". (The ancient joke of Odysseus
> towards Polyphemos: 'Nobody' has hurt me).
>
> Just one thing: if it contains (includes) EMPTY SPACE, it includes space,
> it is not nothing.
>

I actually meant that most of the time, people say "nothing" when they mean
Newtonian empty space. I agree that "nothing" is not empty space.


> And please, do not forget about my adage in the previous post that limits
> (borders) are similarly not includable into nothing, so it must be an
> infinite - well - "nothing".
> It still may contain things we have no knowledge about and in such case it
> is NOT nothing. We just are ignorant.
>

I agree that if it contains things, then it is not "nothing", but you can
"create" a "nothing" by removing them.

Ricardo.


> JM
>
>
>
> On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 1:06 PM, R AM  wrote:
>
>> Some thoughts about "nothing":
>>
>> - If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a
>> property, then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the
>> limitation of generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come from
>> "nothing".
>>
>> - Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists
>> (obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.
>> Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
>> possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.
>>
>> - Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based on the
>> intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas "something"
>> requires an explanation. However, given that the possibility of something
>> existing is necessarily true, an explanation would be required for why
>> there is "nothing" instead of "something".
>>
>> - There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
>> existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)
>>
>> - I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation than the
>> universe we observe is based on a generalization of the idea of classical
>> empty space. However, this intuition is based on what we know about *this*
>> universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than things existing in it). But why
>> this intuition about *our* reality should be extrapolated to metaphysics?
>>
>> - I think that the important question is why this universe instead of any
>> other universe? (including "nothing").
>>
>> Ricardo.
>>
>> On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 6:24 PM, John Clark  wrote:
>>
>>> On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:
>>>
>>>  > Is it so hard to understand a "word"?

>>>
>>> Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years ago
>>> "nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a few years
>>> later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any energy too, then
>>> still later it meant also not having space, and then it meant not even
>>> having time. Something that is lacking matter energy time and space may not
>>> be the purest form of nothing but it is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful
>>> "thing", and if science can explain (and someday it very well may be able
>>> to) how our world with all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such
>>> modest beginnings then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such
>>> activities "incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.
>>>
>>>
>>>
 *>** N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential

>>>
>>> Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious and
>>> extremely dull answer.
>>>
>>>  > I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
  "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
  And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
  It turned into Somethingness

>>>
>>> Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce
>>> something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which is
>>> something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.
>>>
>>>   John K Clark
>>>
>>>
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>>
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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 7:43 PM, John Clark  wrote:

> On Sun, May 6, 2012   wrote:
>
> > There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
>> existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)
>>
>
> EXCELLENT!  I wish I'd said that; Picasso said good artists borrow but
> great artists steal, so no doubt some day I will indeed say that.
>

I just found out that this argument had been proposed by Van Inwagen in
1996. I must have read it somewhere and stuck into my mind. Hapens all the
time :-)

Van Inwagen, Peter (1996) “Why Is There Anything at All?”, Proceedings of
the Aristotelian Society, 70: 95-110.

Ricardo.

  John K Clark
>
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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 6:37 PM, Stephen P. King wrote:
>
> Some people claim that something cannot come from "nothing". I think they
> are hanging a property on it.
>
>
> Hi Ricardo,
>
> Yes and some other people claim that something can indeed come out of
> nothing - so long as that something comes with its antithesis so that the
> sum of the two is equal to nothing, kinda like 1 and -1 popping out of
> zero. I think that they are "hanging a property on it" and thus they are
> assuming that it has "hooks" - to follow the metaphor. But I think that
> here we are looking at the symptoms of something else, the symptoms of the
> word "come from" or "caused by" or "emergent". They all involve some kind
> of transformation. Are transformations possible within a "nothing"? What
> about automorphisms? Those transformations that leave some pattern or
> object unchanged?
>

I agree that it is weird to say that something comes out of nothing, as it
implies some sort of time, which is not present in "nothing". I don't know
what to answer you but here is another argument (sort of):

- Let's start with a classical universe (Newtonian, with matter in it).
- Let's remove the matter

What is left is empty classical space. Can something come out of empty
classical space? Of course not. I think that almost always, when people say
"nothing" they actually mean classical empty space.

- Now let's remove the empty space. What is left is "nothing". Can
something come out of this "nothing"? Well, I think it could. At least, I
would say it cannot be discarded, or even, that anything is possible. Our
intuitions about classical empty space shouldn't be imposed on "nothing".
For some reason, people believe that classical empty space and "nothing"
are sort of similar. But, why should they be, at all?


> I think a proper philosopher would say that "nothing" is the state of
> affairs (rather than "nothing" exists).
>
>
> Umm, OK, but would this not make "affairs" more primitive than
> nothing?
>

I think proper philosophers say "state of affairs" when they would like to
use "state" but know they shouldn't :-). OK, just kidding.


> I think that this way of thinking starts of with a collection of
> "somethings" (plural) and classifies "nothing" as that particular member of
> the collection that is the place holder for the absence of a state. This is
> the patterns that we see in the Natural numbers, where ZERO (0) marks the
> spot that divides the positive numbers from the negative numbers.
>
>
I think so.


>  In any case, when people ask the question "why something rather than
> nothing", they implicitely assume that there is some sort of priority for
> "nothing" over something.
>
>  My short answer to "why something rather than nothing?" is "why not?".
>
>
> Yeah, but while that is clever it does not explain much, but I
> appreciate the spirit of the answer.
>
>
I agree, but it forces people to think about why they believe that
"nothing" should be preferably the case, rather than something.

Although we all have had this surprise/revelation "hey, things actually
exist, how come!", it's sort of funny. I mean, we are born with stuff
around us, and this is the case until we die. Our experience in the world
is that of transformation, never of things becoming nothing. Science only
confirms this: existence is hard. It's impossible to make matter/energy
disappear. I mean, really disappear. We wouldn't be able to obtain
"nothing" even if we really really wanted to (not even a Big Crunch). And
yet, we find it difficult to believe that there is something rather than
nothing. Go figure :-). I think it would be interesting to ascertain why
our psychology sends us this way.

>  We tend not to think much of it, but 'Nothing' = Sum of {not a cat, not a
>> dot, not a fist, not a person, not a word, ... }
>>
>
>  I agree, but why the absence of things requires less explanation than
> the presence of things?
>
>
> I think that it requires less of an explicit explanation as it relies
> on the explanations that exist previously in the minds of those that are
> apprehending the explanation. The fact that explanations are what conscious
> entities do with each other, they communicate meanings, not by pushing some
> "stuff" into them, but by implicating patterns of relations between the
> elements of the minds of the entities. Knowledge, learning, perception,
> Understanding are more like synchronization and entrainment than anything
> else.
>
>
I understand what you mean by explanation, but not why "nothing" being the
case would require less explanation than something being the case ...

Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 5/8/2012 12:46 PM, John Mikes wrote:

Ricardo:
good text! I may add to it:
"Who created Nothing? - of course: Nobody". (The ancient joke of Odysseus towards 
Polyphemos: 'Nobody' has hurt me).
Just one thing: if it contains (includes) EMPTY SPACE, it includes space, it is not 
nothing. And please, do not forget about my adage in the previous post that limits 
(borders) are similarly not includable into nothing, so it must be an infinite - well - 
"nothing".
It still may contain things we have no knowledge about and in such case it is NOT 
nothing. We just are ignorant.


If we're ignorant, what do we know about?  Nothing.  :-)

Brent
"What is there?  Everything! So what isn't there?  Nothing!"
 --- Norm Levitt, after Quine

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Mikes]

Ricardo:
good text! I may add to it:
"Who created Nothing? - of course: Nobody". (The ancient joke of Odysseus
towards Polyphemos: 'Nobody' has hurt me).

Just one thing: if it contains (includes) EMPTY SPACE, it includes space,
it is not nothing. And please, do not forget about my adage in the previous
post that limits (borders) are similarly not includable into nothing, so it
must be an infinite - well - "nothing".
It still may contain things we have no knowledge about and in such case it
is NOT nothing. We just are ignorant.

JM



On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 1:06 PM, R AM  wrote:

> Some thoughts about "nothing":
>
> - If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a property,
> then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the limitation of
> generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come from "nothing".
>
> - Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists
> (obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.
> Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
> possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.
>
> - Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based on the
> intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas "something"
> requires an explanation. However, given that the possibility of something
> existing is necessarily true, an explanation would be required for why
> there is "nothing" instead of "something".
>
> - There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
> existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)
>
> - I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation than the
> universe we observe is based on a generalization of the idea of classical
> empty space. However, this intuition is based on what we know about *this*
> universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than things existing in it). But why
> this intuition about *our* reality should be extrapolated to metaphysics?
>
> - I think that the important question is why this universe instead of any
> other universe? (including "nothing").
>
> Ricardo.
>
> On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 6:24 PM, John Clark  wrote:
>
>> On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:
>>
>>  > Is it so hard to understand a "word"?
>>>
>>
>> Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years ago
>> "nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a few years
>> later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any energy too, then
>> still later it meant also not having space, and then it meant not even
>> having time. Something that is lacking matter energy time and space may not
>> be the purest form of nothing but it is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful
>> "thing", and if science can explain (and someday it very well may be able
>> to) how our world with all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such
>> modest beginnings then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such
>> activities "incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.
>>
>>
>>
>>> *>** N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential
>>>
>>
>> Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious and
>> extremely dull answer.
>>
>>  > I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
>>>  "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
>>>  And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
>>>  It turned into Somethingness
>>>
>>
>> Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce
>> something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which is
>> something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.
>>
>>   John K Clark
>>
>>
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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Mikes]

John:
who told you that "anything" evolved? especially: from nothing? that is our
human stupidity presuming a world according to our figments. We "think" in
our terms, i.e. if something seems to be, it had to 'evolve'. (I almost
wrote: 'be created'!)
We 'think' there is something. Do we have the capacity of going back *
further* than *we can*? Certainly not, - YET - we draw conclusions fitting
into our today's liking about such.

Thanks for your remarks on my - now obsolete - memory.

John Mikes

On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 12:24 PM, John Clark  wrote:

> On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:
>
>  > Is it so hard to understand a "word"?
>>
>
> Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years ago
> "nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a few years
> later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any energy too, then
> still later it meant also not having space, and then it meant not even
> having time. Something that is lacking matter energy time and space may not
> be the purest form of nothing but it is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful
> "thing", and if science can explain (and someday it very well may be able
> to) how our world with all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such
> modest beginnings then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such
> activities "incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.
>
>
>
>> *>** N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential
>>
>
> Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious and
> extremely dull answer.
>
>  > I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
>>  "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
>>  And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
>>  It turned into Somethingness
>>
>
> Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce
> something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which is
> something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.
>
>   John K Clark
>
>
>  --
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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Stephen P. King]

On 5/7/2012 9:16 AM, R AM wrote:
On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 8:04 PM, Stephen P. King > wrote:


Hi Stephen,


- If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a
property, then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including
the limitation of generating "something". Therefore, "something"
may come from "nothing".


Can nothing be treated as an object itself? Can we "hang"
properties on it?


Some people claim that something cannot come from "nothing". I think 
they are hanging a property on it.


Hi Ricardo,

Yes and some other people claim that something can indeed come out 
of nothing - so long as that something comes with its antithesis so that 
the sum of the two is equal to nothing, kinda like 1 and -1 popping out 
of zero. I think that they are "hanging a property on it" and thus they 
are assuming that it has "hooks" - to follow the metaphor. But I think 
that here we are looking at the symptoms of something else, the symptoms 
of the word "come from" or "caused by" or "emergent". They all involve 
some kind of transformation. Are transformations possible within a 
"nothing"? What about automorphisms? Those transformations that leave 
some pattern or object unchanged?




Are we actually talking about "substance" as synonomous with what
the philosophers of old used to use as the object minus its
properties? I like to use the word "Existence" in this case, as it
would seen to naturally include "nothing" and "something" as its
most trivial dual categories.



- Given that something exists, it is possible that something
exists (obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was
the case. Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing"
co-existing with the possibility of "something" existing, which
is rather bizarre.


Does Nothingness exist? Can Nothingness non-exist? At what
point are we playing games with words and at what point are we
being meaningful?


I think a proper philosopher would say that "nothing" is the state of 
affairs (rather than "nothing" exists).


Umm, OK, but would this not make "affairs" more primitive than 
nothing?  I think that this way of thinking starts of with a collection 
of "somethings" (plural) and classifies "nothing" as that particular 
member of the collection that is the place holder for the absence of a 
state. This is the patterns that we see in the Natural numbers, where 
ZERO (0) marks the spot that divides the positive numbers from the 
negative numbers.



You are pointing out how "possibility" seems to be implicitly tied
to the relation between something and nothing. In my reasoning
this is why I consider existence as "necessary possibility".
Unfortunately, this consideration suffers from the ambiguity
inherent in semiotics known as the figure-frame relation
.
Is the word we use to denote
 or connote
 a referent?
What if we mean to use both denotative and connotative uses?


One way of intuiting "nothing" is that which remains when you have 
removed everything.


Right.

In fact, I believe that the philosophical "nothing" is nothing else 
than classical empty space elevated to metaphysical heights.


I agree. We see this in the modern notion of the vacuum or vacua 
(plural).


The problem is that even after you have removed everything (including 
time and space), there is something that cannot be removed: the 
possibility of something existing.


Exactly! Possibility itself can never be completely extracted, it 
can only be countered.


It would seem that "nothing" (or rather, NOTHING) shouldn't allow even 
for the logical possibility of something existing. But given that 
something exists, this possibility cannot be removed. That is why I 
said that the idea of "nothing" and the logical possibility of 
existence, sharing the same state of affairs, is bizarre (if not 
incompatible).


I agree. This is what I have in mind as well.



- Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is
based on the intuition that "nothing" would require no
explanation, whereas "something" requires an explanation.
However, given that the possibility of something existing is
necessarily true, an explanation would be required for why there
is "nothing" instead of "something".


I agree. We might even think or intuit "nothing" as the
absolute absence of 'everything' : the sum of all particulars that
piece-wise and collection-wise are not-nothing; whereas
'something' is a special case of 'everything'; a particular case
of everything.


Probably the best way of defining "nothing" is the absence of 
everything (not this, not that, ...). But isn't it funny t

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 08 May 2012, at 11:49, R AM wrote:




On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 9:54 PM, Bruno Marchal   
wrote:
As for the remark about nothingness having only one way of being  
and there being a lot more ways of existing, it's cute, but it's  
sophistry. Non-being is not a countable way of being.


I agree.

Hi Bruno, what do you agree with exactly? That non-being is not  
being is obvious but irrelevant. The real question here is whether  
nothing and the multiple "somethings" can be put in the same  
collection in a non-arbitrary way. And they can: the collection of  
elements created by removing "things" from one another. And  
"nothing" is one of these elements.


Why? If you remove all elements of a set, it remains an empty set. If  
you remove all sets of a universe of sets, it remains an empty  
collection, which in this case is also a set.





It's the absence of being - obviously - so can't be presented as  
one among a myriad of possible configurations of the universe.


I never claimed that "nothing" is a possible configuration of the  
universe. All I said is that there are more ways of being than of  
non-being, which is obviously true, in the same way that there is  
just one zero, but many positive integers.


This confirms that when we use the term nothing, it will make sense  
only if we are already agreeing working in some theory of the things  
we are talking about. Numbers => 0. Set theory => empty set, QM => Q  
vacuum, etc.


Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 7, 5:22 pm, meekerdb  wrote:
> On 5/7/2012 2:07 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
>
> > On May 7, 3:44 pm, meekerdb  wrote:
> >> On 5/7/2012 12:04 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
>
> >>> On May 7, 1:25 pm, meekerdb    wrote:
>  The 'laws' of logic are just the rules of language that ensure we don't 
>  issue
>  contradictory statements.
> >>> You have to have logic to begin with to conceive of the desirability
> >>> of avoiding contradiction. Something has to put the 'contra' into our
> >>> 'diction'.
> >> No, you only need to understand negation, to have a language with the word 
> >> 'not'.  Then if
> >> someone says to you "X" and "not-X" you immediately realize the need to 
> >> avoid
> >> contradiction, because a contradiction fails to express anything.
> > "You immediately realize" = logic. A baby doesn't immediately realize
> > that there is a need to avoid contradiction, even though they may
> > understand bottle and not-bottle.
>
> They don't have language either.  "Bottle and not-bottle" can only occur in 
> language,
> there is no fact corresponding to "bottle and not-bottle".

Huh? The fact of 'bottle' is the experience of seeing, holding, and
using the bottle. The experience of wanting or expecting the bottle
when it is no longer present is 'not-bottle'.

>
> > An insane person or just irrational
> > person may not care about avoiding contradiction even though they
> > understand negation.
>
> They may not care to make sense.  But then why should we listen to them.

I'm not saying that we should listen to them or whether or not they
care to make sense, I'm pointing out how you are taking sense and
logic completely for granted when you say "you immediately realize the
need to avoid contradiction, because a contradiction fails to express
anything"; when you claim that "The 'laws' of logic are just the rules
of language that ensure we don't issue contradictory statements."

>
> > Any anticipation of an outcome which results in a
> > modification of one's intention is a form of logic. If I avoid
> > something for a reason, I am using logic.
>
> Yes, but not logic alone.  You're using it to connect facts and values and 
> actions that
> you know about in other ways.

Yes, those other ways are through perception, experience, and thought,
ie sense. They don't appear from language, language develops through
sense.

>
>
>
> >>>    The 'laws' of quantum mechanics also follow from simple
>  assumptions about the world having symmetries (c.f. Russell Standish's 
>  "Theory of Nothing"
>  and Vic Stenger's "The Comprehensible Cosmos") and having a symmetry is 
>  a kind of
>  'nothing', i.e. having no distinguishing characteristic under some 
>  transformation.
> >>> Invariance is one aspect of symmetry,
> >> It's an essential aspect. A symmetry is a property that is invariant under 
> >> some
> >> transformation.
> > All properties are invariant under some transformation, that's what
> > makes them a property. Symmetry is a very specific sense of combined
> > variance, invariance, but most of all a sense of conjugation by
> > opposition.
>
> You seem to think of symmetry a as single thing.

In one sense it is, in other senses it isn't. Symmetry is just a word,
but it points to a subject, which always extends to other subjects.

> Of course all properties are invariant
> under the identity transformation.  But some things are invariant under 
> discrete
> translations, some under continuous translation, some under reflection, some 
> under
> interchange,...

I'm just talking about a common sense use of property and invariant.
By definition a property is a characteristic that persists. Invariance
is necessary but not sufficient to describe symmetry or asymmetry.

>
>
>
> >>> but you cannot reduce symmetry
> >>> to being a 'kind of nothing'. Symmetry cannot be anything less than a
> >>> feature of sense.
> >> I can if I explicitly say what kind it is - which I did.
> > Your reduction reduces symmetry to be no different from asymmetry.
> > Asymmetry is invariant under some transformation also. You have only
> > made the word symmetry meaningless.
>
> Symmetry isn't a thing and asymmetry isn't either.

It's not a thing in the sense of being an object, no, but it is a
qualitative property of pattern recognition.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 9:54 PM, Bruno Marchal  wrote:

> As for the remark about nothingness having only one way of being and there
> being a lot more ways of existing, it's cute, but it's sophistry. Non-being
> is not a countable way of being.
>
>
> I agree.
>

Hi Bruno, what do you agree with exactly? That non-being is not being is
obvious but irrelevant. The real question here is whether nothing and the
multiple "somethings" can be put in the same collection in a non-arbitrary
way. And they can: the collection of elements created by removing "things"
from one another. And "nothing" is one of these elements.

It's the absence of being - obviously - so can't be presented as one among
> a myriad of possible configurations of the universe.
>
> I never claimed that "nothing" is a possible configuration of the
universe. All I said is that there are more ways of being than of
non-being, which is obviously true, in the same way that there is just one
zero, but many positive integers.

Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 07 May 2012, at 19:42, John Clark wrote:


On Sun, May 6, 2012  Craig Weinberg  wrote:

>>>I'm not an engineer.

>> I know, that's part of the problem.

> I think it's part of the solution. As the saying goes, if all you  
have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.


It's far easier to get a reputation as a good philosopher than a  
good engineer because you can't fake it. If a engineer is full of  
shit there is no way to hide it, the bridge falls down or the laptop  
catches on fire or the power grid dies and plunges the nation into  
darkness and all the world knows he's a idiot, but a philosopher can  
hide his ineptitude by saying things that can never be proved or  
disproved in his lifetime or expressing platitudes in pretentious  
language that sounds much deeper than they really are or by  
expressing his personal preferences as if they were universal truths  
and not just a matter of taste.


To keep his job a engineer needs to be right, or at least not dead  
wrong, nearly 100% of the time because if he is dead wrong people  
could quite literally end up dead, but a philosopher can never be  
right and still get tenure. When a engineer makes a blunder it's  
front page news but when a philosopher makes a blunder few know or  
care and he never misses a paycheck. The engineer has by far the  
harder job.


This is because since 1500 years rigor is simply not allowed in  
philosophy and theology. It is mainly political. In a part of academy  
it seems that results throwing doubt on the Aristotelian dogma are  
simply ignored. We are still prehistorical in theology, for reason of  
control, not for reason of reason. Enlightenment was half  
enlightenment. And it is grave: if an engineer is wrong, problems can  
be quickly fixed, but if you are wrong in the human sciences, problems  
can last for millennia.


Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 5/7/2012 2:07 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:

On May 7, 3:44 pm, meekerdb  wrote:

On 5/7/2012 12:04 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:


On May 7, 1:25 pm, meekerdbwrote:

The 'laws' of logic are just the rules of language that ensure we don't issue
contradictory statements.

You have to have logic to begin with to conceive of the desirability
of avoiding contradiction. Something has to put the 'contra' into our
'diction'.

No, you only need to understand negation, to have a language with the word 
'not'.  Then if
someone says to you "X" and "not-X" you immediately realize the need to avoid
contradiction, because a contradiction fails to express anything.

"You immediately realize" = logic. A baby doesn't immediately realize
that there is a need to avoid contradiction, even though they may
understand bottle and not-bottle.


They don't have language either.  "Bottle and not-bottle" can only occur in language, 
there is no fact corresponding to "bottle and not-bottle".



An insane person or just irrational
person may not care about avoiding contradiction even though they
understand negation.


They may not care to make sense.  But then why should we listen to them.


Any anticipation of an outcome which results in a
modification of one's intention is a form of logic. If I avoid
something for a reason, I am using logic.


Yes, but not logic alone.  You're using it to connect facts and values and actions that 
you know about in other ways.








   The 'laws' of quantum mechanics also follow from simple

assumptions about the world having symmetries (c.f. Russell Standish's "Theory of 
Nothing"
and Vic Stenger's "The Comprehensible Cosmos") and having a symmetry is a kind 
of
'nothing', i.e. having no distinguishing characteristic under some 
transformation.

Invariance is one aspect of symmetry,

It's an essential aspect. A symmetry is a property that is invariant under some
transformation.

All properties are invariant under some transformation, that's what
makes them a property. Symmetry is a very specific sense of combined
variance, invariance, but most of all a sense of conjugation by
opposition.


You seem to think of symmetry a as single thing.  Of course all properties are invariant 
under the identity transformation.  But some things are invariant under discrete 
translations, some under continuous translation, some under reflection, some under 
interchange,...





but you cannot reduce symmetry
to being a 'kind of nothing'. Symmetry cannot be anything less than a
feature of sense.

I can if I explicitly say what kind it is - which I did.

Your reduction reduces symmetry to be no different from asymmetry.
Asymmetry is invariant under some transformation also. You have only
made the word symmetry meaningless.


Symmetry isn't a thing and asymmetry isn't either.

Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 7, 3:44 pm, meekerdb  wrote:
> On 5/7/2012 12:04 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
>
> > On May 7, 1:25 pm, meekerdb  wrote:
>
> >> The 'laws' of logic are just the rules of language that ensure we don't 
> >> issue
> >> contradictory statements.
> > You have to have logic to begin with to conceive of the desirability
> > of avoiding contradiction. Something has to put the 'contra' into our
> > 'diction'.
>
> No, you only need to understand negation, to have a language with the word 
> 'not'.  Then if
> someone says to you "X" and "not-X" you immediately realize the need to avoid
> contradiction, because a contradiction fails to express anything.

"You immediately realize" = logic. A baby doesn't immediately realize
that there is a need to avoid contradiction, even though they may
understand bottle and not-bottle. An insane person or just irrational
person may not care about avoiding contradiction even though they
understand negation. Any anticipation of an outcome which results in a
modification of one's intention is a form of logic. If I avoid
something for a reason, I am using logic.

>
>
>
> >   The 'laws' of quantum mechanics also follow from simple
> >> assumptions about the world having symmetries (c.f. Russell Standish's 
> >> "Theory of Nothing"
> >> and Vic Stenger's "The Comprehensible Cosmos") and having a symmetry is a 
> >> kind of
> >> 'nothing', i.e. having no distinguishing characteristic under some 
> >> transformation.
> > Invariance is one aspect of symmetry,
>
> It's an essential aspect. A symmetry is a property that is invariant under 
> some
> transformation.

All properties are invariant under some transformation, that's what
makes them a property. Symmetry is a very specific sense of combined
variance, invariance, but most of all a sense of conjugation by
opposition.

>
> > but you cannot reduce symmetry
> > to being a 'kind of nothing'. Symmetry cannot be anything less than a
> > feature of sense.
>
> I can if I explicitly say what kind it is - which I did.

Your reduction reduces symmetry to be no different from asymmetry.
Asymmetry is invariant under some transformation also. You have only
made the word symmetry meaningless.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

Or maybe it's global warming which might make the Earth uninhabitable. Of course in a 
sense that's an engineering success, not failure.


There have 2053 nuclear bombs exploded.  I'm not sure how many were above ground; about 
200 U.S. and probably an equal number of Soviet.


Brent

On 5/7/2012 12:11 PM, Richard Ruquist wrote:

John,

On the subject of engineering blunders, here is the most catastrophic engineering 
blunder humanity has ever faced. It could make North America uninhabitable.
http://www.kurzweilai.net/fukushima-fuel-pool-is-urgent-national-security-issue-for-america-top-threat-facing-humanity?utm_source=KurzweilAI+Daily+Newsletter&utm_campaign=8179b0de4d-UA-946742-1&utm_medium=email 
 



On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 1:42 PM, John Clark > wrote:


On Sun, May 6, 2012  Craig Weinberg mailto:whatsons...@gmail.com>> wrote:

>>>I'm not an engineer.

>> I know, that's part of the problem.


> I think it's part of the solution. As the saying goes, if all you 
have is a
hammer, everything looks like a nail.


It's far easier to get a reputation as a good philosopher than a good 
engineer
because you can't fake it. If a engineer is full of shit there is no way to 
hide it,
the bridge falls down or the laptop catches on fire or the power grid dies 
and
plunges the nation into darkness and all the world knows he's a idiot, but a
philosopher can hide his ineptitude by saying things that can never be 
proved or
disproved in his lifetime or expressing platitudes in pretentious language 
that
sounds much deeper than they really are or by expressing his personal 
preferences as
if they were universal truths and not just a matter of taste.

To keep his job a engineer needs to be right, or at least not dead wrong, 
nearly
100% of the time because if he is dead wrong people could quite literally 
end up
dead, but a philosopher can never be right and still get tenure. When a 
engineer
makes a blunder it's front page news but when a philosopher makes a blunder 
few know
or care and he never misses a paycheck. The engineer has by far the harder 
job.

  John K Clark


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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 07 May 2012, at 15:42, Pierz wrote:

The question, "Why is there anything at all?" used to do my head in  
when I was a kid. I can still sometimes get into kind of head- 
exploding moment sometimes thinking about it. Russell's answer to me  
remains the most satisfying, even though in a sense it is a non- 
answer, a simple ackowledgement that there is no logical reason why  
there has to be a cause of 'everything' even though everything may  
have a cause. Krauss's argument - I admit I haven't read the book  
(yet), so I am speaking of what I understand rhe hist of his  
argument to be - may be interesting physics/cosmology, but I agree  
with the critics that it doesn't really get to the bottom of the  
proverbial 'turtle stack', and it shouldn't claim to, because such a  
bottom turtle is in principle impossible.


John Clarke claims that a 'nothing' that contains the laws of  
quantum mechanics and the potential to produce time, space and  
matter is a very pitiful something if it is a something at all. But  
I think it sneaks a lot more into its pitiful somethingness than at  
first meets the eye. Not only the laws of quantum mechanics, but the  
laws of logic and mathematics without which quantum mechanics could  
not be formulated or expressed - as Bruno woukd be quick to point  
out. I really must read the book to understand how this vacuum can  
be unstable in the absence of time -


The problem is that physicists have not yet succeed in marrying QM and  
GR, which is needed to get a quantum theory of space-time. You can bet  
on strings or on loop gravity though, or on the Dewitt-Wheeler  
equation, which, actually make physical time vanishing completely from  
the big picture. It is an internal parameter only.



doesn't stability or instability depend on time by implying the  
possibility or otherwise of change? But even accepting this it seems  
to me that in order to reason about the properties of this vacuum  
(e.g., its instability or otherwise) means that the vacuum must  
exist. Getting what seems like extremely close to non-existence is  
still a million miles (actually an infinite distance) from actual  
non-existence, because what defines the distinction between non- 
existence and existence is not anything to do with being extremely  
minimal. An extremely small number, say 10 to the -10, is  
extremely minimal, but still not zero, and still an infinite  
distance, in a sense, from zero.


Krauss's argument may satisfy the cosmologist's desire to see the  
cause of the universe reduced to something extremely simple, but it  
does not satisfy the wondering child or philosopher who is  
thunderstruck by the strangeness of there being any existence at  
all, however simple or rudimentary its origins. It's wrong to say  
such a child or philosopher is caught in a pointless mind loop  
trying asking how something that does not even have the potential to  
produce anything can, nevertheless, produce something. Of course  
that is absurd. The question in my mind as a wondering child was  
never 'How did the nothing that must have come before the universe  
produce the universe?' It was my mind chasing the chain of causation  
of things and realizing that, whatever that chain looked like, I  
could never trace it all the way back to absolute nothing - so why  
this mysterious beingness? The fact is it's beyond reason. Call it a  
gift or a miracle and you're as close to it as anything. God is no  
answer, mind you - he's just another spurious bottom turtle. God,  
laws of quantum mechanics: it's just different attempts to stop the  
rot of infinite regress, hammer in a wedge somewhere and say  
"Because".  Why do the law of quantum physics exist? Because. Why  
does God, the UD, the Buddhist void exist? Because.


It is different for the UD. Its existence is a theorem in any theory  
of everything, like this one:


classical logic +
0 ≠ s(x)
s(x) = s(y) -> x = y
x+0 = x
x+s(y) = s(x+y)
x*0=0
x*s(y)=(x*y)+x

or in this one:

Kxy = x
Sxyz = xz(yz)




As for the remark about nothingness having only one way of being and  
there being a lot more ways of existing, it's cute, but it's  
sophistry. Non-being is not a countable way of being.


I agree.


It's the absence of being - obviously - so can't be presented as one  
among a myriad of possible configurations of the universe.


It that exists. Exactly.

Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/


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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 5/7/2012 12:04 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:

On May 7, 1:25 pm, meekerdb  wrote:


The 'laws' of logic are just the rules of language that ensure we don't issue
contradictory statements.

You have to have logic to begin with to conceive of the desirability
of avoiding contradiction. Something has to put the 'contra' into our
'diction'.


No, you only need to understand negation, to have a language with the word 'not'.  Then if 
someone says to you "X" and "not-X" you immediately realize the need to avoid 
contradiction, because a contradiction fails to express anything.




  The 'laws' of quantum mechanics also follow from simple

assumptions about the world having symmetries (c.f. Russell Standish's "Theory of 
Nothing"
and Vic Stenger's "The Comprehensible Cosmos") and having a symmetry is a kind 
of
'nothing', i.e. having no distinguishing characteristic under some 
transformation.

Invariance is one aspect of symmetry,


It's an essential aspect. A symmetry is a property that is invariant under some 
transformation.



but you cannot reduce symmetry
to being a 'kind of nothing'. Symmetry cannot be anything less than a
feature of sense.


I can if I explicitly say what kind it is - which I did.

Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Richard Ruquist]

John,

On the subject of engineering blunders, here is the most catastrophic
engineering blunder humanity has ever faced. It could make North America
uninhabitable.
http://www.kurzweilai.net/fukushima-fuel-pool-is-urgent-national-security-issue-for-america-top-threat-facing-humanity?utm_source=KurzweilAI+Daily+Newsletter&utm_campaign=8179b0de4d-UA-946742-1&utm_medium=email


On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 1:42 PM, John Clark  wrote:

> On Sun, May 6, 2012  Craig Weinberg  wrote:
>
>  >>>I'm not an engineer.

>>>
>>>
>>  >> I know, that's part of the problem.
>>>
>>
>> > I think it's part of the solution. As the saying goes, if all you have
>> is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
>>
>
> It's far easier to get a reputation as a good philosopher than a good
> engineer because you can't fake it. If a engineer is full of shit there is
> no way to hide it, the bridge falls down or the laptop catches on fire or
> the power grid dies and plunges the nation into darkness and all the world
> knows he's a idiot, but a philosopher can hide his ineptitude by saying
> things that can never be proved or disproved in his lifetime or expressing
> platitudes in pretentious language that sounds much deeper than they really
> are or by expressing his personal preferences as if they were universal
> truths and not just a matter of taste.
>
> To keep his job a engineer needs to be right, or at least not dead wrong,
> nearly 100% of the time because if he is dead wrong people could quite
> literally end up dead, but a philosopher can never be right and still get
> tenure. When a engineer makes a blunder it's front page news but when a
> philosopher makes a blunder few know or care and he never misses a
> paycheck. The engineer has by far the harder job.
>
>   John K Clark
>
>
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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 7, 1:42 pm, John Clark  wrote:
> On Sun, May 6, 2012  Craig Weinberg  wrote:
>
> >>>I'm not an engineer.
>
> > >> I know, that's part of the problem.
>
> > > I think it's part of the solution. As the saying goes, if all you have
> > is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
>
> It's far easier to get a reputation as a good philosopher than a good
> engineer because you can't fake it. If a engineer is full of shit there is
> no way to hide it, the bridge falls down or the laptop catches on fire or
> the power grid dies and plunges the nation into darkness and all the world
> knows he's a idiot, but a philosopher can hide his ineptitude by saying
> things that can never be proved or disproved in his lifetime or expressing
> platitudes in pretentious language that sounds much deeper than they really
> are or by expressing his personal preferences as if they were universal
> truths and not just a matter of taste.
>
> To keep his job a engineer needs to be right, or at least not dead wrong,
> nearly 100% of the time because if he is dead wrong people could quite
> literally end up dead, but a philosopher can never be right and still get
> tenure. When a engineer makes a blunder it's front page news but when a
> philosopher makes a blunder few know or care and he never misses a
> paycheck. The engineer has by far the harder job.
>

The engineer has a harder job, just as it requires more effort to
hammer a nail than it does to write with a pen. That doesn't make him
better equipped to address the nature of the cosmos as a whole. Being
literal minded is appropriate for literal tasks - building bridges,
inventing the combustion engine, etc. If the universe is what I
suspect it is, then it is only half literal, with the figurative half
being the more relevant 'head end'.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 7, 1:25 pm, meekerdb  wrote:

> The 'laws' of logic are just the rules of language that ensure we don't issue
> contradictory statements.

You have to have logic to begin with to conceive of the desirability
of avoiding contradiction. Something has to put the 'contra' into our
'diction'.

 The 'laws' of quantum mechanics also follow from simple
> assumptions about the world having symmetries (c.f. Russell Standish's 
> "Theory of Nothing"
> and Vic Stenger's "The Comprehensible Cosmos") and having a symmetry is a 
> kind of
> 'nothing', i.e. having no distinguishing characteristic under some 
> transformation.

Invariance is one aspect of symmetry, but you cannot reduce symmetry
to being a 'kind of nothing'. Symmetry cannot be anything less than a
feature of sense.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 5/7/2012 8:30 AM, Richard Ruquist wrote:
The combination of MWI and string physics may suggest a reason why quantum physics must 
exist and it has to do with the string landscape plus the acceptance on your part of 
some of the (outrageous) claims of string theory. I say that the most outrageous claim 
of string theory is that the compactified dimensions, (the so-called Calabi-Yau 
Manifolds (CYMs), which are discrete ball-like particles a thousand Planck lengths in 
diameter) possess the constants and laws of physics. So assuming that every CYM is 
identical in our universe, then the number of possible different universes depends on 
the number of distinct versions of the CYMs, which is the so-called String Landscape.


Now according to Yau in his book "The Shape of Inner Space" each CYM particle has 500 
topological holes, more or less I presume. And a constraining higher-order 
electromagnetic flux winds through these holes. Now if the CYMs contain the laws of 
quantum physics, it is reasonable, but perhaps not necessary, that that quantum physics 
applies to this flux and that it may exist in any number of quantum states. To determine 
the string landscape, string theorists have assumed the nice round number of 10 for the 
number of quantum states the flux may possess. If so then the number of possible 
different configurations of a CYM is 10^500. (For comparison the number of Planck 
volumes in our universe is at least 10^175 or the number of CYMs is about 10^165).


So in a MWI context, even if each universe in the multiverse required a distinct CYM, 
there seems to be more than enough to go around. Even if the number of flux quantum 
states were say equal to the CYM dimensionality (6), the number of distinct CYMs  at 
10^390 seems to provide ample MWI universes, even for a Omniverse. But if the CYMs were 
like a classical computer rather than a quantum computer, the number of distinct CYMs at 
2^500= 10^150 seems insufficient for MWI.


I don't see how you're connecting MWI to different string physics?  MWI is about different 
observations in *the same* physical universe.  It has nothing to do with different 
effective quantum fields or different symmetry breaking.


Brent




Therefore if all these assumptions are acceptable to you, quantum physics must apply to 
the CYMs for there to be enough distinct CYMs to support MWI. That is a reason why we 
have quantum physics (Perhaps a LoL rather than a QED is appropriate here)

Richard

On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 9:42 AM, Pierz mailto:pier...@gmail.com>> wrote:

The question, "Why is there anything at all?" used to do my head in when I 
was a
kid. I can still sometimes get into kind of head-exploding moment sometimes 
thinking
about it. Russell's answer to me remains the most satisfying, even though 
in a sense
it is a non-answer, a simple ackowledgement that there is no logical reason 
why
there has to be a cause of 'everything' even though everything may have a 
cause.
Krauss's argument - I admit I haven't read the book (yet), so I am speaking 
of what
I understand rhe hist of his argument to be - may be interesting 
physics/cosmology,
but I agree with the critics that it doesn't really get to the bottom of the
proverbial 'turtle stack', and it shouldn't claim to, because such a bottom 
turtle
is in principle impossible.

John Clarke claims that a 'nothing' that contains the laws of quantum 
mechanics and
the potential to produce time, space and matter is a very pitiful something 
if it is
a something at all. But I think it sneaks a lot more into its pitiful 
somethingness
than at first meets the eye. Not only the laws of quantum mechanics, but 
the laws of
logic and mathematics without which quantum mechanics could not be 
formulated or
expressed - as Bruno woukd be quick to point out. I really must read the 
book to
understand how this vacuum can be unstable in the absence of time - doesn't
stability or instability depend on time by implying the possibility or 
otherwise of
change? But even accepting this it seems to me that in order to reason 
about the
properties of this vacuum (e.g., its instability or otherwise) means that 
the vacuum
must exist. Getting what seems like extremely close to non-existence is 
still a
million miles (actually an infinite distance) from actual non-existence, 
because
what defines the distinction between non-existence and existence is not 
anything to
do with being extremely minimal. An extremely small number, say 10 to the 
-10,
is extremely minimal, but still not zero, and still an infinite distance, 
in a
sense, from zero.

Krauss's argument may satisfy the cosmologist's desire to see the cause of 
the
universe reduced to something extremely simple, but it does not satisfy the
wondering child or philosopher who is thunderstruck by the strangeness of 
there
being any existence at all, however si

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Clark]

On Sun, May 6, 2012  Craig Weinberg  wrote:

>>>I'm not an engineer.
>>>
>>
>>
> >> I know, that's part of the problem.
>>
>
> > I think it's part of the solution. As the saying goes, if all you have
> is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.
>

It's far easier to get a reputation as a good philosopher than a good
engineer because you can't fake it. If a engineer is full of shit there is
no way to hide it, the bridge falls down or the laptop catches on fire or
the power grid dies and plunges the nation into darkness and all the world
knows he's a idiot, but a philosopher can hide his ineptitude by saying
things that can never be proved or disproved in his lifetime or expressing
platitudes in pretentious language that sounds much deeper than they really
are or by expressing his personal preferences as if they were universal
truths and not just a matter of taste.

To keep his job a engineer needs to be right, or at least not dead wrong,
nearly 100% of the time because if he is dead wrong people could quite
literally end up dead, but a philosopher can never be right and still get
tenure. When a engineer makes a blunder it's front page news but when a
philosopher makes a blunder few know or care and he never misses a
paycheck. The engineer has by far the harder job.

  John K Clark

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 5/7/2012 6:42 AM, Pierz wrote:

The question, "Why is there anything at all?" used to do my head in when I was 
a kid. I can still sometimes get into kind of head-exploding moment sometimes thinking 
about it. Russell's answer to me remains the most satisfying, even though in a sense it 
is a non-answer, a simple ackowledgement that there is no logical reason why there has to 
be a cause of 'everything' even though everything may have a cause. Krauss's argument - I 
admit I haven't read the book (yet), so I am speaking of what I understand rhe hist of 
his argument to be - may be interesting physics/cosmology, but I agree with the critics 
that it doesn't really get to the bottom of the proverbial 'turtle stack', and it 
shouldn't claim to, because such a bottom turtle is in principle impossible.

John Clarke claims that a 'nothing' that contains the laws of quantum mechanics 
and the potential to produce time, space and matter is a very pitiful something 
if it is a something at all. But I think it sneaks a lot more into its pitiful 
somethingness than at first meets the eye. Not only the laws of quantum 
mechanics, but the laws of logic and mathematics without which quantum 
mechanics could not be formulated or expressed - as Bruno woukd be quick to 
point out.


The 'laws' of logic are just the rules of language that ensure we don't issue 
contradictory statements.  The 'laws' of quantum mechanics also follow from simple 
assumptions about the world having symmetries (c.f. Russell Standish's "Theory of Nothing" 
and Vic Stenger's "The Comprehensible Cosmos") and having a symmetry is a kind of 
'nothing', i.e. having no distinguishing characteristic under some transformation.  
Stenger's book is more detailed and explicit than Krauss'.


Brent




I really must read the book to understand how this vacuum can be unstable in 
the absence of time - doesn't stability or instability depend on time by 
implying the possibility or otherwise of change? But even accepting this it 
seems to me that in order to reason about the properties of this vacuum (e.g., 
its instability or otherwise) means that the vacuum must exist. Getting what 
seems like extremely close to non-existence is still a million miles (actually 
an infinite distance) from actual non-existence, because what defines the 
distinction between non-existence and existence is not anything to do with 
being extremely minimal. An extremely small number, say 10 to the -10, is 
extremely minimal, but still not zero, and still an infinite distance, in a 
sense, from zero.

Krauss's argument may satisfy the cosmologist's desire to see the cause of the universe 
reduced to something extremely simple, but it does not satisfy the wondering child or 
philosopher who is thunderstruck by the strangeness of there being any existence at all, 
however simple or rudimentary its origins. It's wrong to say such a child or philosopher 
is caught in a pointless mind loop trying asking how something that does not even have 
the potential to produce anything can, nevertheless, produce something. Of course that is 
absurd. The question in my mind as a wondering child was never 'How did the nothing that 
must have come before the universe produce the universe?' It was my mind chasing the 
chain of causation of things and realizing that, whatever that chain looked like, I could 
never trace it all the way back to absolute nothing - so why this mysterious beingness? 
The fact is it's beyond reason. Call it a gift or a miracle and you're as close to it as 
anything. God is no answer, mind you - he's just another spurious bottom turtle. God, 
laws of quantum mechanics: it's just different attempts to stop the rot of infinite 
regress, hammer in a wedge somewhere and say "Because".  Why do the law of 
quantum physics exist? Because. Why does God, the UD, the Buddhist void exist? Because.

As for the remark about nothingness having only one way of being and there 
being a lot more ways of existing, it's cute, but it's sophistry. Non-being is 
not a countable way of being. It's the absence of being - obviously - so can't 
be presented as one among a myriad of possible configurations of the universe.






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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 7, 9:42 am, Pierz  wrote:

> Krauss's argument may satisfy the cosmologist's desire to see the cause of 
> the universe reduced to something extremely simple, but it does not satisfy 
> the wondering child or philosopher who is thunderstruck by the strangeness of 
> there being any existence at all, however simple or rudimentary its origins. 
> It's wrong to say such a child or philosopher is caught in a pointless mind 
> loop trying asking how something that does not even have the potential to 
> produce anything can, nevertheless, produce something. Of course that is 
> absurd. The question in my mind as a wondering child was never 'How did the 
> nothing that must have come before the universe produce the universe?' It was 
> my mind chasing the chain of causation of things and realizing that, whatever 
> that chain looked like, I could never trace it all the way back to absolute 
> nothing - so why this mysterious beingness? The fact is it's beyond reason.

Yes, it is beyond reason, but it is not beyond sense. If we model the
cosmos with sense as the ground of being instead of absolute nothing,
then neither physics or mathematics are mysterious. They are lowest
common denominator experiences. The longest lasting, most general ways
to make sense.

Call it a gift or a miracle and you're as close to it as anything. God
is no answer, mind you - he's just another spurious bottom turtle.
God, laws of quantum mechanics: it's just different attempts to stop
the rot of infinite regress, hammer in a wedge somewhere and say
"Because".  Why do the law of quantum physics exist? Because. Why does
God, the UD, the Buddhist void exist? Because.

Exactly. My approach is instead of because, I would answer, because we
are human beings right now and that is part of how it seems to human
beings who live here and now.

 'why do we think that quantum physics exist?' because we have built
instruments that consistently confirm our theories that it exists.
'why do people think that God, the UD, the Buddhist void exist'?
because they are able to make sense of their experience as human
beings, mathematicians, religious disciples, etc that way. It is how
our minds feel themselves in the reflection or shadow they cast as
their life/world/universe.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Richard Ruquist]

The combination of MWI and string physics may suggest a reason why quantum
physics must exist and it has to do with the string landscape plus the
acceptance on your part of some of the (outrageous) claims of string
theory. I say that the most outrageous claim of string theory is that the
compactified dimensions, (the so-called Calabi-Yau Manifolds (CYMs), which
are discrete ball-like particles a thousand Planck lengths in diameter)
possess the constants and laws of physics. So assuming that every CYM is
identical in our universe, then the number of possible different universes
depends on the number of distinct versions of the CYMs, which is the
so-called String Landscape.

Now according to Yau in his book "The Shape of Inner Space" each CYM
particle has 500 topological holes, more or less I presume. And a
constraining higher-order electromagnetic flux winds through these holes.
Now if the CYMs contain the laws of quantum physics, it is reasonable, but
perhaps not necessary, that that quantum physics applies to this flux and
that it may exist in any number of quantum states. To determine the string
landscape, string theorists have assumed the nice round number of 10 for
the number of quantum states the flux may possess. If so then the number of
possible different configurations of a CYM is 10^500. (For comparison the
number of Planck volumes in our universe is at least 10^175 or the number
of CYMs is about 10^165).

So in a MWI context, even if each universe in the multiverse required a
distinct CYM, there seems to be more than enough to go around. Even if the
number of flux quantum states were say equal to the CYM dimensionality (6),
the number of distinct CYMs  at 10^390 seems to provide ample MWI
universes, even for a Omniverse. But if the CYMs were like a classical
computer rather than a quantum computer, the number of distinct CYMs at
2^500= 10^150 seems insufficient for MWI.

Therefore if all these assumptions are acceptable to you, quantum physics
must apply to the CYMs for there to be enough distinct CYMs to support MWI.
That is a reason why we have quantum physics (Perhaps a LoL rather than a
QED is appropriate here)
Richard

On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 9:42 AM, Pierz  wrote:

> The question, "Why is there anything at all?" used to do my head in when I
> was a kid. I can still sometimes get into kind of head-exploding moment
> sometimes thinking about it. Russell's answer to me remains the most
> satisfying, even though in a sense it is a non-answer, a simple
> ackowledgement that there is no logical reason why there has to be a cause
> of 'everything' even though everything may have a cause. Krauss's argument
> - I admit I haven't read the book (yet), so I am speaking of what I
> understand rhe hist of his argument to be - may be interesting
> physics/cosmology, but I agree with the critics that it doesn't really get
> to the bottom of the proverbial 'turtle stack', and it shouldn't claim to,
> because such a bottom turtle is in principle impossible.
>
> John Clarke claims that a 'nothing' that contains the laws of quantum
> mechanics and the potential to produce time, space and matter is a very
> pitiful something if it is a something at all. But I think it sneaks a lot
> more into its pitiful somethingness than at first meets the eye. Not only
> the laws of quantum mechanics, but the laws of logic and mathematics
> without which quantum mechanics could not be formulated or expressed - as
> Bruno woukd be quick to point out. I really must read the book to
> understand how this vacuum can be unstable in the absence of time - doesn't
> stability or instability depend on time by implying the possibility or
> otherwise of change? But even accepting this it seems to me that in order
> to reason about the properties of this vacuum (e.g., its instability or
> otherwise) means that the vacuum must exist. Getting what seems like
> extremely close to non-existence is still a million miles (actually an
> infinite distance) from actual non-existence, because what defines the
> distinction between non-existence and existence is not anything to do with
> being extremely minimal. An extremely small number, say 10 to the -10,
> is extremely minimal, but still not zero, and still an infinite distance,
> in a sense, from zero.
>
> Krauss's argument may satisfy the cosmologist's desire to see the cause of
> the universe reduced to something extremely simple, but it does not satisfy
> the wondering child or philosopher who is thunderstruck by the strangeness
> of there being any existence at all, however simple or rudimentary its
> origins. It's wrong to say such a child or philosopher is caught in a
> pointless mind loop trying asking how something that does not even have the
> potential to produce anything can, nevertheless, produce something. Of
> course that is absurd. The question in my mind as a wondering child was
> never 'How did the nothing that must have come before the universe produce
> the universe?' It 

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Mon, May 7, 2012 at 3:42 PM, Pierz  wrote:

>
>
>  The question in my mind as a wondering child was never 'How did the
> nothing that must have come before the universe produce the universe?' It
> was my mind chasing the chain of causation of things and realizing that,
> whatever that chain looked like, I could never trace it all the way back to
> absolute nothing -


There is an interesting point here, although probably not what you
intended. What you say is true, you cannot trace it all the way back to
absolute nothing, because there is no reverse physical process that
transforms something into "nothing" (at least, not into absolute nothing).
Or equivalently, there is no physical process that transforms "absolute
nothing" into something. But if that is the case, why are you so sure that
"nothing" must have come before?

As for the remark about nothingness having only one way of being and there
> being a lot more ways of existing, it's cute, but it's sophistry. Non-being
> is not a countable way of being. It's the absence of being - obviously - so
> can't be presented as one among a myriad of possible configurations of the
> universe.


I agree "nothing" is not a configuration of things, but I think it could be
considered as one element belonging to an abstract space. Let's consider
this universe and the abstract operation of removing things. We can remove
the Sun, Andromeda, etc. "Nothing" is what is left after removing all
things (including space, time, ...). It's one among many. It's not that
different from 0 being a natural number or the empty set being a set.

Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Pierz]

The question, "Why is there anything at all?" used to do my head in when I was 
a kid. I can still sometimes get into kind of head-exploding moment sometimes 
thinking about it. Russell's answer to me remains the most satisfying, even 
though in a sense it is a non-answer, a simple ackowledgement that there is no 
logical reason why there has to be a cause of 'everything' even though 
everything may have a cause. Krauss's argument - I admit I haven't read the 
book (yet), so I am speaking of what I understand rhe hist of his argument to 
be - may be interesting physics/cosmology, but I agree with the critics that it 
doesn't really get to the bottom of the proverbial 'turtle stack', and it 
shouldn't claim to, because such a bottom turtle is in principle impossible. 

John Clarke claims that a 'nothing' that contains the laws of quantum mechanics 
and the potential to produce time, space and matter is a very pitiful something 
if it is a something at all. But I think it sneaks a lot more into its pitiful 
somethingness than at first meets the eye. Not only the laws of quantum 
mechanics, but the laws of logic and mathematics without which quantum 
mechanics could not be formulated or expressed - as Bruno woukd be quick to 
point out. I really must read the book to understand how this vacuum can be 
unstable in the absence of time - doesn't stability or instability depend on 
time by implying the possibility or otherwise of change? But even accepting 
this it seems to me that in order to reason about the properties of this vacuum 
(e.g., its instability or otherwise) means that the vacuum must exist. Getting 
what seems like extremely close to non-existence is still a million miles 
(actually an infinite distance) from actual non-existence, because what defines 
the distinction between non-existence and existence is not anything to do with 
being extremely minimal. An extremely small number, say 10 to the -10, is 
extremely minimal, but still not zero, and still an infinite distance, in a 
sense, from zero. 

Krauss's argument may satisfy the cosmologist's desire to see the cause of the 
universe reduced to something extremely simple, but it does not satisfy the 
wondering child or philosopher who is thunderstruck by the strangeness of there 
being any existence at all, however simple or rudimentary its origins. It's 
wrong to say such a child or philosopher is caught in a pointless mind loop 
trying asking how something that does not even have the potential to produce 
anything can, nevertheless, produce something. Of course that is absurd. The 
question in my mind as a wondering child was never 'How did the nothing that 
must have come before the universe produce the universe?' It was my mind 
chasing the chain of causation of things and realizing that, whatever that 
chain looked like, I could never trace it all the way back to absolute nothing 
- so why this mysterious beingness? The fact is it's beyond reason. Call it a 
gift or a miracle and you're as close to it as anything. God is no answer, mind 
you - he's just another spurious bottom turtle. God, laws of quantum mechanics: 
it's just different attempts to stop the rot of infinite regress, hammer in a 
wedge somewhere and say "Because".  Why do the law of quantum physics exist? 
Because. Why does God, the UD, the Buddhist void exist? Because. 

As for the remark about nothingness having only one way of being and there 
being a lot more ways of existing, it's cute, but it's sophistry. Non-being is 
not a countable way of being. It's the absence of being - obviously - so can't 
be presented as one among a myriad of possible configurations of the universe.

 

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
>> possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.
>>
>>
>> Does Nothingness exist? Can Nothingness non-exist? At what point are
>> we playing games with words and at what point are we being meaningful?
>>
>
> I think a proper philosopher would say that "nothing" is the state of
> affairs (rather than "nothing" exists).
>

By the way, Stephen, I didn't mean you are not a proper philosopher, but me
:-) (it was me that used the sentence "nothing co-exists with ...").

Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 8:04 PM, Stephen P. King wrote:

Hi Stephen,


> - If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a property,
> then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the limitation of
> generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come from "nothing".
>
>
> Can nothing be treated as an object itself? Can we "hang" properties
> on it?
>

Some people claim that something cannot come from "nothing". I think they
are hanging a property on it.



> Are we actually talking about "substance" as synonomous with what the
> philosophers of old used to use as the object minus its properties? I like
> to use the word "Existence" in this case, as it would seen to naturally
> include "nothing" and "something" as its most trivial dual categories.
>
>
> - Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists
> (obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.
> Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
> possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.
>
>
> Does Nothingness exist? Can Nothingness non-exist? At what point are
> we playing games with words and at what point are we being meaningful?
>

I think a proper philosopher would say that "nothing" is the state of
affairs (rather than "nothing" exists).


> You are pointing out how "possibility" seems to be implicitly tied to the
> relation between something and nothing. In my reasoning this is why I
> consider existence as "necessary possibility". Unfortunately, this
> consideration suffers from the ambiguity inherent in semiotics known as the 
> figure-frame
> relation.
> Is the word we use to 
> denoteor
> connote  a referent?
> What if we mean to use both denotative and connotative uses?
>
>
One way of intuiting "nothing" is that which remains when you have removed
everything. In fact, I believe that the philosophical "nothing" is nothing
else than classical empty space elevated to metaphysical heights. The
problem is that even after you have removed everything (including time and
space), there is something that cannot be removed: the possibility of
something existing. It would seem that "nothing" (or rather, NOTHING)
shouldn't allow even for the logical possibility of something existing. But
given that something exists, this possibility cannot be removed. That is
why I said that the idea of "nothing" and the logical possibility of
existence, sharing the same state of affairs, is bizarre (if not
incompatible).


>
>  - Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based on
> the intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas
> "something" requires an explanation. However, given that the possibility of
> something existing is necessarily true, an explanation would be required
> for why there is "nothing" instead of "something".
>
>
> I agree. We might even think or intuit "nothing" as the absolute
> absence of 'everything' : the sum of all particulars that piece-wise and
> collection-wise are not-nothing; whereas 'something' is a special case of
> 'everything'; a particular case of everything.
>

Probably the best way of defining "nothing" is the absence of everything
(not this, not that, ...). But isn't it funny that in order to define
"nothing" you have to accept the possibility of everything?

- There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
> existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)
>
>
> But this statement implicitly assumes a measure that itself, then,
> implies a common basis for comparison. Is there a set, class, category or
> other 'collection' that has all of the forms, modalities, aspects, etc. of
> something along with nothing?
>

I guess it couldn't be a set.

In any case, when people ask the question "why something rather than
nothing", they implicitely assume that there is some sort of priority for
"nothing" over something.

My short answer to "why something rather than nothing?" is "why not?".


>
>  We tend not to think much of it, but 'Nothing' = Sum of {not a cat, not a
> dot, not a fist, not a person, not a word, ... }
>

I agree, but why the absence of things requires less explanation than the
presence of things?


>
> I suspect that the answer to this question is trivial: We see this
> universe because it is the only one that is minimally (?) consistent with
> our ability to *both* observe it and communicate with each other about it.
>

OK, now prove the mass of the electron from these axioms :-)

Ricardo.

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Stephen P. King]

On 5/6/2012 3:25 PM, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote:

On 06.05.2012 20:04 Stephen P. King said the following:

...


[Side note: This is where we start to see that our words can be such to
sometimes have only other words as referents and sometimes have actual
objects (not words) as referents. (I wish we could get a semiotic theory
expert to join us! Can any one channel Charles S. Peirce
 for us?)]



You will find nowadays even biosemiotics - see four lectures on this 
subject:


http://embryogenesisexplained.com/2012/03/a-short-course-on-biosemiotics-1.html 



Evgenii



Hi Evgenii,

Thanks!

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Onward!

Stephen

"Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed."
~ Francis Bacon

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Evgenii Rudnyi]

On 06.05.2012 20:04 Stephen P. King said the following:

...


[Side note: This is where we start to see that our words can be such to
sometimes have only other words as referents and sometimes have actual
objects (not words) as referents. (I wish we could get a semiotic theory
expert to join us! Can any one channel Charles S. Peirce
 for us?)]



You will find nowadays even biosemiotics - see four lectures on this 
subject:


http://embryogenesisexplained.com/2012/03/a-short-course-on-biosemiotics-1.html

Evgenii

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 6, 1:33 pm, John Clark  wrote:
> On Sat, May 5, 2012 Craig Weinberg  wrote:
>
> > >> That depends on what you mean by "nothing".
> >>   1) Lack of matter, a vacuum.
> >>   2) Lack of matter and energy
> >>   3) Lack of matter and energy and space
> >>   4) Lack of matter and energy and space and time.
> >>   5) Lack of even the potential to produce something.
>
> > > Without #5 though, the scientific cosmology is no better than any other
> > creation myth.
>
> Good heavens, what a dumb thing to say!

What an irrelevant, ad hominem opinion!

> Even if science can't explain how
> the fundamental laws of quantum mechanics came to be, if it can explain how
> those few simple laws generated time and space and matter and energy and
> life you think that's no better than Greek mythology?

I didn't say that. I say that it is no better than Greek mythology at
explaining the origin of the universe. It may have many many more
practical applications, but as far as explaining where the universe
came from, it's still a 21st century creation myth (really probably a
holdover from 20th century tbh).

>! Idiotic. And what
> the hell do you expect science or religion or anything else to do with #5?
> You define X as something that can not produce Y and then you demand to
> know how X produces Y.  Nuts.

#5 isn't a problem once we understand that sense is primordial.
Nothing nuts about it, although it is unfamiliar to many people.
People who have some degree of expertise with Indian cosmology seem to
find the idea quite agreeable.

>
> > I have explained that causality itself is an epiphenomenon of time which
> > is an emergent property of experience or sense which
>
> Causality is not nothing, neither phenomenon nor epiphenomenon is nothing,
> time is not nothing, experience is not nothing, sense is not nothing, and
> "emergent property" just means X created Y but I don't know how. You really
> haven't explained much now have you.

Sense is not nothing. Nothing comes from sense. Sense is primary. You
are too busy spitting and condescending to notice that I have
explained everything that I claim to.

>
> >> BULLSHIT! Anybody who says these are "incredibly shallow questions" is a
> >> fool. Full stop.
>
> > > They are shallow to me. I'm not an engineer.
>
> I know, that's part of the problem.

I think it's part of the solution. As the saying goes, if all you have
is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

>
> >I don't care about the mechanism of the universe, I care only about the
> > biggest possible picture.
>
> You think you can answer the deepest question in the universe but you don't
> even bother to glance at the many many profound questions that science
> already has answers to, many found centuries ago.

What specifically are you talking about that you accuse me of being
ignorant of?

> Gaining wisdom takes work
> but you are not willing to put in the time, and so as a result you have no
> more knowledge of how the universe actually operates than your average
> 18'th century gentleman. You Sir are a dilettante.

You confuse inner wisdom with external information. Your argument
continues to be ad hominem fallacy.

>
> > Sorry that was a typo. It should be nothing instead of something.
>
> Easy mistake to make, the difference between the two is so small.

It can seem that way sometimes.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 6, 1:06 pm, R AM  wrote:
> Some thoughts about "nothing":
>
> - If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a property,
> then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the limitation of
> generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come from "nothing".

Nice one, but I think it breaks because of the symbol grounding
problem. The lack of a reason to prevent something doesn't create it
out of nothing though. Properties don't actually exist independently
of things and experiences. They are not causally efficacious at all,
only a way we can understand our experiences. Categories,
associations, groups, properties, etc are pattern recognition events
of an analytical mind, not actual principles which constrain reality.

If nothing can generate something because there is no law against it,
then it can also not generate anything since there is no law against
the impossibility of something either. To me, this is a good example
of why computation cannot precede awareness. The rules of arithmetic
would have to come from more rules that are ultimately no more likely
to make sense as no sense...unless you first have a such thing as
sense-making to guide the rules.

>
> - Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists
> (obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.
> Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
> possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.
>
> - Why should "nothing" be the default state?

Yes! That's what I'm saying. If there is a default state, I nominate
everythingness, out of which a virtual nothingness (time and space)
can emerge. Sense is the diffraction between the default state and the
innumerable diffracted states within states. If you turn your original
assertion upside down, you might see that in the context of
everythingness or totality/singularity, it would be correct to say
that since there is nothing stopping everything from existing
eternally outside of time if time were only a relativistic perception,
then we should hypothesize that it does.

> I think this is based on the
> intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas "something"
> requires an explanation. However, given that the possibility of something
> existing is necessarily true, an explanation would be required for why
> there is "nothing" instead of "something".

Right. It's an illogical jump. But 'nothing' as a bubble in the
totality/singularity makes perfect sense as space (vacuum) and time
(memory, or 'not-now'). Nothing is symmetrically expressed as a
spatial gap between objects and an enfolding of temporal subjects.

>
> - There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
> existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)
>
> - I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation than the
> universe we observe is based on a generalization of the idea of classical
> empty space. However, this intuition is based on what we know about *this*
> universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than things existing in it). But why
> this intuition about *our* reality should be extrapolated to metaphysics?
>
> - I think that the important question is why this universe instead of any
> other universe? (including "nothing").

Yes. My answer is that it is a human universe for us because humans
are who we happen to be. I don't think that this anthropic view
supports an MWI type inevitability of all universes necessarily
though. I think the whole thing is guided by sense, significance, and
entropy.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Stephen P. King]

On 5/6/2012 1:06 PM, R AM wrote:

Some thoughts about "nothing":


Hi Ricardo,

I like these thoughts (as they imply questions!)!



- If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a 
property, then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the 
limitation of generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come 
from "nothing".


Can nothing be treated as an object itself? Can we "hang" 
properties on it? Are we actually talking about "substance" as 
synonomous with what the philosophers of old used to use as the object 
minus its properties? I like to use the word "Existence" in this case, 
as it would seen to naturally include "nothing" and "something" as its 
most trivial dual categories.


   [Side note: This is where we start to see that our words can be such 
to sometimes have only other words as referents and sometimes have 
actual objects (not words) as referents.  (I wish we could get a 
semiotic theory expert to join us! Can any one channel Charles S. Peirce 
 for us?)]




- Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists 
(obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case. 
Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with 
the possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.


Does Nothingness exist? Can Nothingness non-exist? At what point 
are we playing games with words and at what point are we being 
meaningful? You are pointing out how "possibility" seems to be 
implicitly tied to the relation between something and nothing. In my 
reasoning this is why I consider existence as "necessary possibility". 
Unfortunately, this consideration suffers from the ambiguity inherent in 
semiotics known as the figure-frame relation 
. 
Is the word we use to denote 
 or connote 
 a referent? What 
if we mean to use both denotative and connotative uses?




- Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based on 
the intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas 
"something" requires an explanation. However, given that the 
possibility of something existing is necessarily true, an explanation 
would be required for why there is "nothing" instead of "something".


I agree. We might even think or intuit "nothing" as the absolute 
absence of 'everything' : the sum of all particulars that piece-wise and 
collection-wise are not-nothing; whereas 'something' is a special case 
of 'everything'; a particular case of everything.




- There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing 
existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)


But this statement implicitly assumes a measure that itself, then, 
implies a common basis for comparison. Is there a set, class, category 
or other 'collection' that has all of the forms, modalities, aspects, 
etc. of something along with nothing? Would this set, class, category, 
etc. have a denotative/connotative name? At what point does it become 
impossible to 'name' something?




- I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation than 
the universe we observe is based on a generalization of the idea of 
classical empty space. However, this intuition is based on what we 
know about *this* universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than things 
existing in it). But why this intuition about *our* reality should be 
extrapolated to metaphysics?


And it is "explanations' that we are interested in here and thus we 
spend time and thought here on these words. ;-) I would like to point 
out that 'nothing' does seem to require a lot less explanation simply 
because it is defined in terms of the negation of what is already 
potentially in the mind of the reader of the word and thus using a is a 
connotative definition. We tend not to think much of it, but 'Nothing' = 
Sum of {not a cat, not a dot, not a fist, not a person, not a word, ... }
We require concepts like the complement of a set in our very 
thoughts... I like to use the concept of an equivalence class to 
consider these questions. We could say that Nothing is the equivalence 
relation on the class of {not a cat, not a dot, not a fist, not a 
person, not a word, ... }




- I think that the important question is why this universe instead of 
any other universe? (including "nothing").


I suspect that the answer to this question is trivial: We see this 
universe because it is the only one that is minimally (?) consistent 
with our ability to _both_ observe it and communicate with each other 
about it.




Ricardo.

On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 6:24 PM, John Clark > wrote:


On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes mailto:jami...@gmail.com>> wrote:

> Is it so hard to understand a "word"?


Y

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Clark]

On Sun, May 6, 2012   wrote:

> There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
> existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)
>

EXCELLENT!  I wish I'd said that; Picasso said good artists borrow but
great artists steal, so no doubt some day I will indeed say that.

  John K Clark

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Clark]

On Sat, May 5, 2012 Craig Weinberg  wrote:


> >> That depends on what you mean by "nothing".
>>   1) Lack of matter, a vacuum.
>>   2) Lack of matter and energy
>>   3) Lack of matter and energy and space
>>   4) Lack of matter and energy and space and time.
>>   5) Lack of even the potential to produce something.
>>
>
> > Without #5 though, the scientific cosmology is no better than any other
> creation myth.
>

Good heavens, what a dumb thing to say!  Even if science can't explain how
the fundamental laws of quantum mechanics came to be, if it can explain how
those few simple laws generated time and space and matter and energy and
life you think that's no better than Greek mythology?! Idiotic. And what
the hell do you expect science or religion or anything else to do with #5?
You define X as something that can not produce Y and then you demand to
know how X produces Y.  Nuts.

> I have explained that causality itself is an epiphenomenon of time which
> is an emergent property of experience or sense which


Causality is not nothing, neither phenomenon nor epiphenomenon is nothing,
time is not nothing, experience is not nothing, sense is not nothing, and
"emergent property" just means X created Y but I don't know how. You really
haven't explained much now have you.

>> BULLSHIT! Anybody who says these are "incredibly shallow questions" is a
>> fool. Full stop.
>>
>
> > They are shallow to me. I'm not an engineer.


I know, that's part of the problem.

>I don't care about the mechanism of the universe, I care only about the
> biggest possible picture.


You think you can answer the deepest question in the universe but you don't
even bother to glance at the many many profound questions that science
already has answers to, many found centuries ago. Gaining wisdom takes work
but you are not willing to put in the time, and so as a result you have no
more knowledge of how the universe actually operates than your average
18'th century gentleman. You Sir are a dilettante.

> Sorry that was a typo. It should be nothing instead of something.
>

Easy mistake to make, the difference between the two is so small.

  John K Clark

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Richard Ruquist]

Nothing does not exist...
Richard

On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 1:06 PM, R AM  wrote:

> Some thoughts about "nothing":
>
> - If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a property,
> then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the limitation of
> generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come from "nothing".
>
> - Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists
> (obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.
> Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
> possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.
>
> - Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based on the
> intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas "something"
> requires an explanation. However, given that the possibility of something
> existing is necessarily true, an explanation would be required for why
> there is "nothing" instead of "something".
>
> - There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
> existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)
>
> - I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation than the
> universe we observe is based on a generalization of the idea of classical
> empty space. However, this intuition is based on what we know about *this*
> universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than things existing in it). But why
> this intuition about *our* reality should be extrapolated to metaphysics?
>
> - I think that the important question is why this universe instead of any
> other universe? (including "nothing").
>
> Ricardo.
>
> On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 6:24 PM, John Clark  wrote:
>
>> On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:
>>
>> > Is it so hard to understand a "word"?
>>>
>>
>> Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years ago
>> "nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a few years
>> later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any energy too, then
>> still later it meant also not having space, and then it meant not even
>> having time. Something that is lacking matter energy time and space may not
>> be the purest form of nothing but it is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful
>> "thing", and if science can explain (and someday it very well may be able
>> to) how our world with all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such
>> modest beginnings then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such
>> activities "incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.
>>
>>
>>
>>> *>** N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential
>>>
>>
>> Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious and
>> extremely dull answer.
>>
>> > I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
>>>  "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
>>>  And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
>>>  It turned into Somethingness
>>>
>>
>> Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce
>> something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which is
>> something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.
>>
>>   John K Clark
>>
>>
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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[R AM]

Some thoughts about "nothing":

- If nothing has no properties, and a limitation is considered a property,
then "nothing" cannot have any limitations, including the limitation of
generating "something". Therefore, "something" may come from "nothing".

- Given that something exists, it is possible that something exists
(obviously). The later would be true even if "nothing" was the case.
Therefore, we should envision the state of "nothing" co-existing with the
possibility of "something" existing, which is rather bizarre.

- Why should "nothing" be the default state? I think this is based on the
intuition that "nothing" would require no explanation, whereas "something"
requires an explanation. However, given that the possibility of something
existing is necessarily true, an explanation would be required for why
there is "nothing" instead of "something".

- There are many ways something can exist, but just one of nothing
existing. Therefore, "nothing" is less likely :-)

- I think the intuition that "nothing" requires less explanation than the
universe we observe is based on a generalization of the idea of classical
empty space. However, this intuition is based on what we know about *this*
universe (i.e. empty space is simpler than things existing in it). But why
this intuition about *our* reality should be extrapolated to metaphysics?

- I think that the important question is why this universe instead of any
other universe? (including "nothing").

Ricardo.

On Sun, May 6, 2012 at 6:24 PM, John Clark  wrote:

> On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:
>
> > Is it so hard to understand a "word"?
>>
>
> Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years ago
> "nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a few years
> later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any energy too, then
> still later it meant also not having space, and then it meant not even
> having time. Something that is lacking matter energy time and space may not
> be the purest form of nothing but it is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful
> "thing", and if science can explain (and someday it very well may be able
> to) how our world with all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such
> modest beginnings then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such
> activities "incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.
>
>
>
>> *>** N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential
>>
>
> Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious and
> extremely dull answer.
>
> > I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
>>  "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
>>  And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
>>  It turned into Somethingness
>>
>
> Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce
> something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which is
> something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.
>
>   John K Clark
>
>
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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Clark]

On Sat, May 5, 2012  John Mikes  wrote:

> Is it so hard to understand a "word"?
>

Yes, the word "nothing" keeps evolving. Until about a hundred years ago
"nothing" just meant a vacuum, space empty of any matter; then a few years
later the meaning was expanded to include lacking any energy too, then
still later it meant also not having space, and then it meant not even
having time. Something that is lacking matter energy time and space may not
be the purest form of nothing but it is, you must admit, a pretty pitiful
"thing", and if science can explain (and someday it very well may be able
to) how our world with all it's beautiful complexity came to be from such
modest beginnings then that would not be a bad days work, and to call such
activities "incredibly shallow" as some on this list have is just idiotic.



> *>** N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential
>

Then the question "can something come from nothing?" has a obvious and
extremely dull answer.

> I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
>  "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
>  And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
>  It turned into Somethingness
>

Then your version of nothing had something, the potential to produce
something. I also note the use of the word "when", thus time, which is
something, existed in your "nothing" universe as well as potential.

  John K Clark

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 05 May 2012, at 13:49, ronaldheld wrote:


Does nothing mean zero or the empty set in this thread?


There are as many notions of nothing/everything that there are notion  
of things.


"Nothing" can be interpreted in many ways, differently for each theory  
candidate to be a theory of everything (ontology/epistemologies).


The everything idea in this list is that conceptually simple theory  
are preferable than complex theory, but conceptually simple theory  
tend to multiply the possibilities and the ontologies, and the taking  
into account of the first person view entails such possibilities  
interfere.


Comp explains as most as possible why there is something rather  
nothing. UDA makes elementary arithmetic enough, and elementary  
arithmetic can already explain why you can't get them with less. So  
our belief in {0, 1, 2, ...} is mysterious, and *has to be*  
mysterious. But then we have the explanation of the emergence of  
quanta and qualia from {0, 1, ...} and the + and * laws.
Any first order logic specification of a Turing universal system would  
do. The key discovery is the discovery of the universal numbers, and  
the ways they reflect themselves in the arithmetical truth/reality.


Bruno





   Ronald

On May 5, 2:52 am, Bruno Marchal  wrote:

On 04 May 2012, at 17:48, John Clark wrote:




If the nothing of a vacuum is really full of potentials,



If you insist on the strictest definition of "nothing" which is not
even the potential of producing anything, then even God Himself
could not produce something from nothing; and this line of thought
is quite clearly leading precisely nowhere.


At the meta level of a theory, "nothing" and "everything" are
basically equivalent with respect to the difficulty to be define  
them.

In set theory, everything (the "universe" of set) is given by the
unary intersection of the empty set, for example. And the quantum
vacuum, needs the whole non trivial assumption of quantum mechanics.
The "no" and the "every" in "nothing and everything" depend on the
logical assumptions. The real difficulty is in the definition or
choice of the notion of "things".

Bruno

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/


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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 5, 1:51 pm, John Clark  wrote:
> On Fri, May 4, 2012 at 1:54 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
>
> > So you agree that it is impossible to have something come from nothing.
>
> That depends on what you mean by "nothing".
> 1) Lack of matter, a vacuum.
> 2) Lack of matter and energy
> 3) Lack of matter and energy and space
> 4) Lack of matter and energy and space and time.
> 5) Lack of even the potential to produce something.

For me it's simpler, because I think that energy is only the
experience of matter, time is the experience of relating sets of
experiences to each other, and space is the experience of relating
materials to each other. Nothing only has to mean lack of experience
of any kind.

>
> Science has valuable things to say about how something can come from
> nothing in all senses of the word "nothing" except for #5,

I have no problem with the idea that the current form of the universe
evolved from simpler forms. I don't think that many people do. Without
#5 though, the scientific cosmology is no better than any other
creation myth. It's more sophisticated, but no closer to explaining
why anything is created at all.

> and nobody else
> can say anything about that either, not even God,

No. I say something about that. I have explained that causality itself
is an epiphenomenon of time which is an emergent property of
experience or sense which is primordial. Sense is primordial not
because I can't think of how to explain it, but because I understand
what it actually is and how it relates to nothingness and singularity/
totality. I don't need anyone else's explanation, or God.

> so that topic is a big
> bore. This is all explained in much greater detail in the book, WHICH YOU
> HAVE NOT READ.

The book explains why it's own critical flaws are boring to point out,
hahaha. That's one way of stifling dissent. My views are explained on
my website WHICH YOU HAVE NOT READ. So what?

>
> > I think of them as incredibly shallow questions.
>
> So you think explaining how from a few simple rules matter energy time and
> space turned into something while other things did not is not only shallow
> but  incredibly shallow.

Oh, it's a great achievement, just as building a house out of
matchsticks or inventing the compass or something would be, but they
aren't particularly meaningful achievements as far as addressing the
depth of our experience.

> The only logical conclusion I can form from that
> is that somebody who really believes that is a incredibly shallow person.

That would be a simplistic logic which comes to such a knee-jerk
judgment.

>
> > it's complete hype to claim that the universe comes from nothing. It's a
> > slogan to sell books.
>
> I don't mind ignorance in general but there is a form of aggressive
> ignorance I find distasteful, somebody who feels they don't need to know
> all that highfalutin book learning, somebody so ignorant they don't know
> they're ignorant, somebody who feels  their comments on a well respected
> physicist's book are worth sharing with others even though THEY HAVE NOT
> READ THE BOOK.

Do you read Christian Apologetics? Theology? Art history? Literary
theory? Do you think that you aren't ignorant, or that your ignorance
isn't distasteful? My criticisms stand. The title of the book is
horseshit, and you know it.

>
> > > I get the gist.
>
> BULLSHIT! Anybody who says these are "incredibly shallow questions" is a
> fool. Full stop.

They are shallow to me. I'm not an engineer. I don't care about the
mechanism of the universe, I care only about the biggest possible
picture. I didn't mean to imply that others can't find them deep. Some
people find the study of sand deep. I was responding to your
accusations that questioning what it really means for something to
come from nothing is shallow. Some people do find it shallow. To me
those people are missing the bigger picture, but maybe they can't help
it.

>
> > > I only point out as a fact that the universe could not come from
> > something.
>
> I see, so the universe can't come from nothing and now it can't come from
> something either, so obviously the universe does not exist and never has.
> Isn't philosophy wonderful.

Sorry that was a typo. It should be nothing instead of something.

>
> >http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-consolation-of-p...
>
> >  http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/has-physics-mad...
>
> > >There is nothing surprising in either of these articles.
>
> I would bet money you haven't read either one and at most skimmed them for
> 20 seconds; reading the actual book is of course out of the question, that
> would take away too much time contemplating your navel.

To me it's like arguing with a Christian fundamentalist who demands I
read the bible to understand his arguments. If your understanding of
their contents doesn't give you anything to say on the subject that is
remotely convincing or surprising to me in any way, why would I bother
chasing your views down for y

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Mikes]

Is it so hard to understand a "word"?
 * -  N O T H I N G  -  *is not a set of anything, no potential, no vacuum,
no borders or characteristics just nothin'.
There is 'nothing' in it means an "it" - measureable and sizable.
Folks-talk refers usually to a lack of a material content.
I agree with Bruno: it is just as hard to identify as everything (the zero
vs.infinite - eternity problem) but if one identifies "nothing" it turns
into something identified.

I wrote once a little silly 'ode' about ontology. I started:
 "In the beginning there was Nothingness.
 And when Nothingness realised it's nothingness
 It turned into Somethingness - an explanation..."
and so on, describing 'a' creation story.

JM
On Fri, May 4, 2012 at 8:00 PM, Pierz  wrote:

> Bertrand Russell pointed out long ago that the properties of the
> members of a set need not be properties of the set itself. I.e.,
> everything in the universe may have a cause but the universe - the set
> of all things - need not. We can argue about whether the ontological
> nature of the "set of everything" is physical, mathematical,
> spiritual, sensical (Weinbergism) or some other -al, but the question
> why any such set exists (its cause) has no answer.
>
> The best response is Sidney Morgenbesser's ( sure you all know it):
> "If there were nothing you'd still be complaining!"
>
> On May 5, 3:54 am, Craig Weinberg  wrote:
> > On May 4, 11:48 am, John Clark  wrote:
> >
> > > On Thu, May 3, 2012 Craig Weinberg  wrote:
> >
> > > > Why would focusing on one issue be a distraction from the other?
> >
> > > Because Human Beings do not have infinite time to deal with, so time
> spent
> > > focusing on issues that Krauss correctly describes as sterile (not
> leading
> > > to new ideas) is time not spent focusing on profound issues that are
> quite
> > > literally infinitely more likely to give birth to new knowledge.
> >
> > That is the same logic that assumes that everyone who downloads a free
> > mp3 is taking money out of the pockets of musicians. It presumes that
> > everyone who wasn't doing one thing would automatically be doing the
> > other.
> >
> > > There are
> > > several ways to define "nothing" but if you insist it means "not even
> > > having the potential to produce something" then contemplating the
> question
> > > "why is there something rather than nothing?" is a obviously a complete
> > > waste of time and does nothing but inflict needless ware and tear on
> > > valuable brain cells.
> >
> > So you agree that it is impossible to have something come from
> > nothing.
> >
> > > However it now looks like if we work very hard
> > > science may actually be able to answer questions like "why there is
> stuff
> > > and not empty space,
> >
> > Not if the answer is just going to be that empty space is full of
> > stuff and stuff is mostly empty space.
> >
> > > why there is space at all, and how both stuff and
> > > space and even the forces we measure could arise from no stuff and no
> > > space". Those are enormously deep questions and that is where we
> should be
> > > spending our limited time, not "impotent and useless" navel gazing.
> >
> > I think of them as incredibly shallow questions. They are like the
> > easy problem of consciousness. Making a big deal out of what terms we
> > use to describe stuffness and non-stuffness. What do you find deep
> > about them?
> >
> >
> >
> > > > Is there some threat of the international science budget being
> siphoned
> > > > off into philosophy?
> >
> > > Yes.
> >
> > Communists? Witches?
> >
> >
> >
> > > > > If the nothing of a vacuum is really full of potentials,
> >
> > > If you insist on the strictest definition of "nothing" which is not
> even
> > > the potential of producing anything, then even God Himself could not
> > > produce something from nothing; and this line of thought is quite
> clearly
> > > leading precisely nowhere.
> >
> > That's why it's complete hype to claim that the universe comes from
> > nothing. It's a slogan to sell books.
> >
> >
> >
> > > > how is it really different from stuff?
> >
> > > You want to know how the potential is any different from the actual? As
> > > Krauss says in his book (which you have not read)
> >
> > I haven't read the Koran either, but I get the gist.
> >
> > > that's like asking how
> > > the potential human being any random male and female have of producing
> > > together is any different from a real flesh and blood person. Your
> problem
> > > is that your brain is caught in a infinite loop trying to figure out
> how a
> > > nothing without even the potential to produce something can
> nevertheless
> > > produce something.
> >
> > I'm not stuck in a loop at all. I only point out as a fact that the
> > universe could not come from something. It's a very straightforward
> > argument, which you apparently agree with except that someone has
> > written a book with a title that suggests otherwise. I'm not trying to
> > figure out how something come

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Clark]

On Fri, May 4, 2012 at 1:54 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:

> So you agree that it is impossible to have something come from nothing.
>

That depends on what you mean by "nothing".
1) Lack of matter, a vacuum.
2) Lack of matter and energy
3) Lack of matter and energy and space
4) Lack of matter and energy and space and time.
5) Lack of even the potential to produce something.

Science has valuable things to say about how something can come from
nothing in all senses of the word "nothing" except for #5, and nobody else
can say anything about that either, not even God, so that topic is a big
bore. This is all explained in much greater detail in the book, WHICH YOU
HAVE NOT READ.

> I think of them as incredibly shallow questions.
>

So you think explaining how from a few simple rules matter energy time and
space turned into something while other things did not is not only shallow
but  incredibly shallow. The only logical conclusion I can form from that
is that somebody who really believes that is a incredibly shallow person.

> it's complete hype to claim that the universe comes from nothing. It's a
> slogan to sell books.
>

I don't mind ignorance in general but there is a form of aggressive
ignorance I find distasteful, somebody who feels they don't need to know
all that highfalutin book learning, somebody so ignorant they don't know
they're ignorant, somebody who feels  their comments on a well respected
physicist's book are worth sharing with others even though THEY HAVE NOT
READ THE BOOK.


> > I get the gist.
>

BULLSHIT! Anybody who says these are "incredibly shallow questions" is a
fool. Full stop.


> > I only point out as a fact that the universe could not come from
> something.


I see, so the universe can't come from nothing and now it can't come from
something either, so obviously the universe does not exist and never has.
Isn't philosophy wonderful.

> http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-consolation-of-p...
>
>   http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/has-physics-mad...
>
> >There is nothing surprising in either of these articles.
>

I would bet money you haven't read either one and at most skimmed them for
20 seconds; reading the actual book is of course out of the question, that
would take away too much time contemplating your navel.

 John K Clark

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[ronaldheld]

Does nothing mean zero or the empty set in this thread?
Ronald

On May 5, 2:52 am, Bruno Marchal  wrote:
> On 04 May 2012, at 17:48, John Clark wrote:
>
>
>
> > > If the nothing of a vacuum is really full of potentials,
>
> > If you insist on the strictest definition of "nothing" which is not
> > even the potential of producing anything, then even God Himself
> > could not produce something from nothing; and this line of thought
> > is quite clearly leading precisely nowhere.
>
> At the meta level of a theory, "nothing" and "everything" are
> basically equivalent with respect to the difficulty to be define them.
> In set theory, everything (the "universe" of set) is given by the
> unary intersection of the empty set, for example. And the quantum
> vacuum, needs the whole non trivial assumption of quantum mechanics.
> The "no" and the "every" in "nothing and everything" depend on the
> logical assumptions. The real difficulty is in the definition or
> choice of the notion of "things".
>
> Bruno
>
> http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 04 May 2012, at 17:48, John Clark wrote:



> If the nothing of a vacuum is really full of potentials,

If you insist on the strictest definition of "nothing" which is not  
even the potential of producing anything, then even God Himself  
could not produce something from nothing; and this line of thought  
is quite clearly leading precisely nowhere.


At the meta level of a theory, "nothing" and "everything" are  
basically equivalent with respect to the difficulty to be define them.
In set theory, everything (the "universe" of set) is given by the  
unary intersection of the empty set, for example. And the quantum  
vacuum, needs the whole non trivial assumption of quantum mechanics.
The "no" and the "every" in "nothing and everything" depend on the  
logical assumptions. The real difficulty is in the definition or  
choice of the notion of "things".


Bruno



http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 4, 8:00 pm, Pierz  wrote:
> Bertrand Russell pointed out long ago that the properties of the
> members of a set need not be properties of the set itself. I.e.,
> everything in the universe may have a cause but the universe - the set
> of all things - need not. We can argue about whether the ontological
> nature of the "set of everything" is physical, mathematical,
> spiritual, sensical (Weinbergism) or some other -al, but the question
> why any such set exists (its cause) has no answer.
>
> The best response is Sidney Morgenbesser's ( sure you all know it):
> "If there were nothing you'd still be complaining!"

Haha, yes, it may be the case that the universe began as the
simultaneous complaint of everythingness and nothingness...the grass
is always greener.

It's true though, it's not a new idea. To me, what makes it bold right
now is to take this cosmology out of the realm of philosophy and into
the realm of scientific reason. If we interpret sense as primary, I
think it becomes easy to see how time, then matter, computation, space
and causality might arise as secondary consequences. To have a set of
anything, we need the possibility of a set, which can only be a form
of pattern recognition. Pattern recognition doesn't arise from data
alone. Something has to experience something directly - I think that
the accounting of that experience as 'data' has to be an afterthought.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Pierz]

Bertrand Russell pointed out long ago that the properties of the
members of a set need not be properties of the set itself. I.e.,
everything in the universe may have a cause but the universe - the set
of all things - need not. We can argue about whether the ontological
nature of the "set of everything" is physical, mathematical,
spiritual, sensical (Weinbergism) or some other -al, but the question
why any such set exists (its cause) has no answer.

The best response is Sidney Morgenbesser's ( sure you all know it):
"If there were nothing you'd still be complaining!"

On May 5, 3:54 am, Craig Weinberg  wrote:
> On May 4, 11:48 am, John Clark  wrote:
>
> > On Thu, May 3, 2012 Craig Weinberg  wrote:
>
> > > Why would focusing on one issue be a distraction from the other?
>
> > Because Human Beings do not have infinite time to deal with, so time spent
> > focusing on issues that Krauss correctly describes as sterile (not leading
> > to new ideas) is time not spent focusing on profound issues that are quite
> > literally infinitely more likely to give birth to new knowledge.
>
> That is the same logic that assumes that everyone who downloads a free
> mp3 is taking money out of the pockets of musicians. It presumes that
> everyone who wasn't doing one thing would automatically be doing the
> other.
>
> > There are
> > several ways to define "nothing" but if you insist it means "not even
> > having the potential to produce something" then contemplating the question
> > "why is there something rather than nothing?" is a obviously a complete
> > waste of time and does nothing but inflict needless ware and tear on
> > valuable brain cells.
>
> So you agree that it is impossible to have something come from
> nothing.
>
> > However it now looks like if we work very hard
> > science may actually be able to answer questions like "why there is stuff
> > and not empty space,
>
> Not if the answer is just going to be that empty space is full of
> stuff and stuff is mostly empty space.
>
> > why there is space at all, and how both stuff and
> > space and even the forces we measure could arise from no stuff and no
> > space". Those are enormously deep questions and that is where we should be
> > spending our limited time, not "impotent and useless" navel gazing.
>
> I think of them as incredibly shallow questions. They are like the
> easy problem of consciousness. Making a big deal out of what terms we
> use to describe stuffness and non-stuffness. What do you find deep
> about them?
>
>
>
> > > Is there some threat of the international science budget being siphoned
> > > off into philosophy?
>
> > Yes.
>
> Communists? Witches?
>
>
>
> > > > If the nothing of a vacuum is really full of potentials,
>
> > If you insist on the strictest definition of "nothing" which is not even
> > the potential of producing anything, then even God Himself could not
> > produce something from nothing; and this line of thought is quite clearly
> > leading precisely nowhere.
>
> That's why it's complete hype to claim that the universe comes from
> nothing. It's a slogan to sell books.
>
>
>
> > > how is it really different from stuff?
>
> > You want to know how the potential is any different from the actual? As
> > Krauss says in his book (which you have not read)
>
> I haven't read the Koran either, but I get the gist.
>
> > that's like asking how
> > the potential human being any random male and female have of producing
> > together is any different from a real flesh and blood person. Your problem
> > is that your brain is caught in a infinite loop trying to figure out how a
> > nothing without even the potential to produce something can nevertheless
> > produce something.
>
> I'm not stuck in a loop at all. I only point out as a fact that the
> universe could not come from something. It's a very straightforward
> argument, which you apparently agree with except that someone has
> written a book with a title that suggests otherwise. I'm not trying to
> figure out how something comes from nothing, the book in question is.
> I understand that causality is something that comes from sense, not
> the other way around, so I don't have to waste my time redefining
> 'nothing' to include a proto-universal universe.
>
> > If you're too busy spinning your wheels to read
> > Professor Krauss's book your only hope is to at least try to squeeze in a
> > little time to read the 2 articles I mentioned in my last post and repeat
> > below for your benefit, they're a sort of readers digest condensed kiddy
> > version of the book, but that's far better than "nothing" by any meaning of
> > the word.
>
> >http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-consolation-of-p...
>
> >  http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/has-physics-mad...
>
> There is nothing surprising in either of these articles.
>
> Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 4, 11:48 am, John Clark  wrote:
> On Thu, May 3, 2012 Craig Weinberg  wrote:
>
> > Why would focusing on one issue be a distraction from the other?
>
> Because Human Beings do not have infinite time to deal with, so time spent
> focusing on issues that Krauss correctly describes as sterile (not leading
> to new ideas) is time not spent focusing on profound issues that are quite
> literally infinitely more likely to give birth to new knowledge.

That is the same logic that assumes that everyone who downloads a free
mp3 is taking money out of the pockets of musicians. It presumes that
everyone who wasn't doing one thing would automatically be doing the
other.

> There are
> several ways to define "nothing" but if you insist it means "not even
> having the potential to produce something" then contemplating the question
> "why is there something rather than nothing?" is a obviously a complete
> waste of time and does nothing but inflict needless ware and tear on
> valuable brain cells.

So you agree that it is impossible to have something come from
nothing.

> However it now looks like if we work very hard
> science may actually be able to answer questions like "why there is stuff
> and not empty space,

Not if the answer is just going to be that empty space is full of
stuff and stuff is mostly empty space.

> why there is space at all, and how both stuff and
> space and even the forces we measure could arise from no stuff and no
> space". Those are enormously deep questions and that is where we should be
> spending our limited time, not "impotent and useless" navel gazing.

I think of them as incredibly shallow questions. They are like the
easy problem of consciousness. Making a big deal out of what terms we
use to describe stuffness and non-stuffness. What do you find deep
about them?

>
> > Is there some threat of the international science budget being siphoned
> > off into philosophy?
>
> Yes.

Communists? Witches?

>
> > > If the nothing of a vacuum is really full of potentials,
>
> If you insist on the strictest definition of "nothing" which is not even
> the potential of producing anything, then even God Himself could not
> produce something from nothing; and this line of thought is quite clearly
> leading precisely nowhere.

That's why it's complete hype to claim that the universe comes from
nothing. It's a slogan to sell books.

>
> > how is it really different from stuff?
>
> You want to know how the potential is any different from the actual? As
> Krauss says in his book (which you have not read)

I haven't read the Koran either, but I get the gist.

> that's like asking how
> the potential human being any random male and female have of producing
> together is any different from a real flesh and blood person. Your problem
> is that your brain is caught in a infinite loop trying to figure out how a
> nothing without even the potential to produce something can nevertheless
> produce something.

I'm not stuck in a loop at all. I only point out as a fact that the
universe could not come from something. It's a very straightforward
argument, which you apparently agree with except that someone has
written a book with a title that suggests otherwise. I'm not trying to
figure out how something comes from nothing, the book in question is.
I understand that causality is something that comes from sense, not
the other way around, so I don't have to waste my time redefining
'nothing' to include a proto-universal universe.

> If you're too busy spinning your wheels to read
> Professor Krauss's book your only hope is to at least try to squeeze in a
> little time to read the 2 articles I mentioned in my last post and repeat
> below for your benefit, they're a sort of readers digest condensed kiddy
> version of the book, but that's far better than "nothing" by any meaning of
> the word.
>
> http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-consolation-of-p...
>
>  http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/has-physics-mad...

There is nothing surprising in either of these articles.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[John Clark]

On Thu, May 3, 2012 Craig Weinberg  wrote:

> Why would focusing on one issue be a distraction from the other?


Because Human Beings do not have infinite time to deal with, so time spent
focusing on issues that Krauss correctly describes as sterile (not leading
to new ideas) is time not spent focusing on profound issues that are quite
literally infinitely more likely to give birth to new knowledge. There are
several ways to define "nothing" but if you insist it means "not even
having the potential to produce something" then contemplating the question
"why is there something rather than nothing?" is a obviously a complete
waste of time and does nothing but inflict needless ware and tear on
valuable brain cells. However it now looks like if we work very hard
science may actually be able to answer questions like "why there is stuff
and not empty space, why there is space at all, and how both stuff and
space and even the forces we measure could arise from no stuff and no
space". Those are enormously deep questions and that is where we should be
spending our limited time, not "impotent and useless" navel gazing.

> Is there some threat of the international science budget being siphoned
> off into philosophy?
>

Yes.


> > If the nothing of a vacuum is really full of potentials,


If you insist on the strictest definition of "nothing" which is not even
the potential of producing anything, then even God Himself could not
produce something from nothing; and this line of thought is quite clearly
leading precisely nowhere.

> how is it really different from stuff?
>

You want to know how the potential is any different from the actual? As
Krauss says in his book (which you have not read) that's like asking how
the potential human being any random male and female have of producing
together is any different from a real flesh and blood person. Your problem
is that your brain is caught in a infinite loop trying to figure out how a
nothing without even the potential to produce something can nevertheless
produce something. If you're too busy spinning your wheels to read
Professor Krauss's book your only hope is to at least try to squeeze in a
little time to read the 2 articles I mentioned in my last post and repeat
below for your benefit, they're a sort of readers digest condensed kiddy
version of the book, but that's far better than "nothing" by any meaning of
the word.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-consolation-of-p...

 http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/has-physics-mad...

  John K Clark

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 03 May 2012, at 23:45, meekerdb wrote:


On 5/3/2012 1:25 PM, John Clark wrote:
Lawrence M Krauss, author of the excellent book "Why is there  
something rather than nothing?" recently wrote a article in  
Scientific American, here is one quote I like"


It may be that even an eternal multiverse in which all universes  
and laws of nature arise dynamically will still leave open some  
‘why’ questions, and therefore never fully satisfy theologians and  
some philosophers.   But focusing on that issue and ignoring the  
remarkable progress we can make toward answering perhaps the most  
miraculous aspect of the something from nothing question— 
understanding why there is ‘stuff’ and not empty space, why there  
is space at all, and how both stuff and space and even the forces  
we measure could arise from no stuff and no space—is, in my  
opinion, impotent, and useless.


For more see:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-consolation-of-philos&offset=2 
 


There is another good article at:

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/has-physics-made-philosophy-and-religion-obsolete/256203/

 John K Clark


See David Albert's review

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/books/review/a-universe-from-nothing-by-lawrence-m-krauss.html?_r=1

Also see Vic Stenger's response to Albert's critique

http://blog.talkingphilosophy.com/?p=4754#_edn3


Obviously comp is closer to Albert, but Albert is still ignorant of  
"number's theology".
Krauss illustrates how pseudo-religious science can be, from time to  
time.


Thanks to the links,

Bruno



http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 5/3/2012 1:25 PM, John Clark wrote:
Lawrence M Krauss, author of the excellent book "Why is there something rather than 
nothing?" recently wrote a article in Scientific American, here is one quote I like"


It may be that even an eternal multiverse in which all universes and laws of nature 
arise dynamically will still leave open some ‘why’ questions, and therefore never fully 
satisfy theologians and some philosophers.   But focusing on that issue and ignoring the 
remarkable progress we can make toward answering perhaps the most miraculous aspect of 
the something from nothing question—understanding why there is ‘stuff’ and not empty 
space, why there is space at all, and how both stuff and space and even the forces we 
measure could arise from no stuff and no space—is, in my opinion, impotent, and useless.


For more see:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-consolation-of-philos&offset=2 



There is another good article at:

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/has-physics-made-philosophy-and-religion-obsolete/256203/

  John K Clark


See David Albert's review

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/books/review/a-universe-from-nothing-by-lawrence-m-krauss.html?_r=1

Also see Vic Stenger's response to Albert's critique

 http://blog.talkingphilosophy.com/?p=4754#_edn3

Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Craig Weinberg]

On May 3, 4:25 pm, John Clark  wrote:
> Lawrence M Krauss, author of the excellent book "Why is there something
> rather than nothing?" recently wrote a article in Scientific American, here
> is one quote I like"
>
> It may be that even an eternal multiverse in which all universes and laws
> of nature arise dynamically will still leave open some ‘why’ questions, and
> therefore never fully satisfy theologians and some philosophers.   But
> focusing on that issue and ignoring the remarkable progress we can make
> toward answering perhaps the most miraculous aspect of the something from
> nothing question—understanding why there is ‘stuff’ and not empty space,
> why there is space at all, and how both stuff and space and even the forces
> we measure could arise from no stuff and no space—is, in my opinion,
> impotent, and useless.
>
> For more see:
>
> http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-consolation-of-p...
>
> There is another good article at:
>
> http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/04/has-physics-mad...

Why would focusing on one issue be a distraction from the other? Is
there some threat of the international science budget being siphoned
off into philosophy?

I don't see how questioning the obvious absurdity of something coming
from nothing in the context of a cosmology centered on cause and
effect is dangerous in any way. To me, it's the naked emperor saying
his robe will be much more beautiful if only everyone would avert
their eyes.

If the nothing of a vacuum is really full of potentials, how is it
really different from stuff? Why should we care? Any difference
between stuff and space is trivial compared to the existence of the
possibility of difference and knowing what difference is.

Craig

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Mon, Sep 26, 2011 at 1:54 PM, meekerdb  wrote:

>  On 9/26/2011 7:03 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
>
>
>
> On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 9:03 PM, meekerdb  wrote:
>
>>   On 9/25/2011 5:27 PM, Jason Resch wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 6:35 PM, meekerdb  wrote:
>>
>>> On 9/25/2011 11:28 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
>>>
 I mentioned QM only to mentioned a computer emulable theory of
 molecules.
 I find quite possible that QM explains biochemistry, given the
 incredible theory of chemistry the SWE equation allow (molecules and the
 electronic shape of atoms is really what QM explains the most elegantly and
 successfully, but this is besides my point).

 But you are coherent: if you want materialism, you will need a non
 turing emulable theory of matter, and of mind.
 Good luck, because it needs already some amount of work to conceive
 something not Turing emulable in math, and in physics, it is even more
 difficult.

>>>
>>>  But QM is based on complex numbers over the reals, which are already not
>>> Turing emulable.
>>>
>>>
>> Has a real number ever been measured by any physicist?
>>
>> Jason
>>
>>
>>  Sure.  He measured one side of the right triangle to be 1cubit and the
>> other side to be 1cubit and concluded that the third side was sqrt(2)cubit.
>>
>>
> That's not an example of a physicist measuring a real number, nor is it a
> real life example.
>
> In real life the physicist would wonder to how many significant figures he
> measured the sides of the triangle, and to how many significant figures he
> measured the angle of the triangle.  Perhaps the physicist rounded to 1
> cubit when in reality it was .9909012 cubits (or in constant flux as the
> atoms jostle around).
>
>
> So he gets sqrt (1.9909012).
>
>
Assuming infinite significant figures.  If such a measurement could be made
then there wouldn't still be a debate about whether or not space is discrete
or continuous.

Jason

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 9/26/2011 7:03 AM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 9:03 PM, meekerdb > wrote:


On 9/25/2011 5:27 PM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 6:35 PM, meekerdb mailto:meeke...@verizon.net>> wrote:

On 9/25/2011 11:28 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:

I mentioned QM only to mentioned a computer emulable theory of 
molecules.
I find quite possible that QM explains biochemistry, given the 
incredible
theory of chemistry the SWE equation allow (molecules and the 
electronic
shape of atoms is really what QM explains the most elegantly and
successfully, but this is besides my point).

But you are coherent: if you want materialism, you will need a non 
turing
emulable theory of matter, and of mind.
Good luck, because it needs already some amount of work to conceive
something not Turing emulable in math, and in physics, it is even 
more
difficult.


But QM is based on complex numbers over the reals, which are already 
not Turing
emulable.


Has a real number ever been measured by any physicist?

Jason


Sure.  He measured one side of the right triangle to be 1cubit and the 
other side to
be 1cubit and concluded that the third side was sqrt(2)cubit.


That's not an example of a physicist measuring a real number, nor is it a real 
life example.

In real life the physicist would wonder to how many significant figures he measured the 
sides of the triangle, and to how many significant figures he measured the angle of the 
triangle.  Perhaps the physicist rounded to 1 cubit when in reality it was .9909012 
cubits (or in constant flux as the atoms jostle around).


So he gets sqrt (1.9909012).

Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 9:03 PM, meekerdb  wrote:

>  On 9/25/2011 5:27 PM, Jason Resch wrote:
>
>
>
> On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 6:35 PM, meekerdb  wrote:
>
>> On 9/25/2011 11:28 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
>>
>>> I mentioned QM only to mentioned a computer emulable theory of molecules.
>>> I find quite possible that QM explains biochemistry, given the incredible
>>> theory of chemistry the SWE equation allow (molecules and the electronic
>>> shape of atoms is really what QM explains the most elegantly and
>>> successfully, but this is besides my point).
>>>
>>> But you are coherent: if you want materialism, you will need a non turing
>>> emulable theory of matter, and of mind.
>>> Good luck, because it needs already some amount of work to conceive
>>> something not Turing emulable in math, and in physics, it is even more
>>> difficult.
>>>
>>
>>  But QM is based on complex numbers over the reals, which are already not
>> Turing emulable.
>>
>>
> Has a real number ever been measured by any physicist?
>
> Jason
>
>
> Sure.  He measured one side of the right triangle to be 1cubit and the
> other side to be 1cubit and concluded that the third side was sqrt(2)cubit.
>
>
That's not an example of a physicist measuring a real number, nor is it a
real life example.

In real life the physicist would wonder to how many significant figures he
measured the sides of the triangle, and to how many significant figures he
measured the angle of the triangle.  Perhaps the physicist rounded to 1
cubit when in reality it was .9909012 cubits (or in constant flux as the
atoms jostle around).

Jason

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 26 Sep 2011, at 01:35, meekerdb wrote:


On 9/25/2011 11:28 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
I mentioned QM only to mentioned a computer emulable theory of  
molecules.
I find quite possible that QM explains biochemistry, given the  
incredible theory of chemistry the SWE equation allow (molecules  
and the electronic shape of atoms is really what QM explains the  
most elegantly and successfully, but this is besides my point).


But you are coherent: if you want materialism, you will need a non  
turing emulable theory of matter, and of mind.
Good luck, because it needs already some amount of work to conceive  
something not Turing emulable in math, and in physics, it is even  
more difficult.


But QM is based on complex numbers over the reals, which are already  
not Turing emulable.


QM does not use non constructive or non computable numbers. The use of  
real numbers is just the usual simplification. In the application it  
does not matter if we use real or rational numbers (real numbers are  
not observed in nature, how could we?).


A non computable physical phenomena would be like e^iCt, with C a  
precise non computable numbers (like Chaitin's omega, for example). If  
we are machine, we cannot distinguish a non computable phenomena from  
a very complex (more complex than us) computable phenomena.


Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 25 Sep 2011, at 08:20, meekerdb wrote:


On 9/24/2011 6:34 PM, Jason Resch wrote:


I said explicitly that "exist" means to be in the ontology of some  
model, and so it is always relative to that model (and similarly  
for nonexistent).



Bruno's shown how the physical world is part of the same model that  
includes the integers.


I don't think so. He has shown that computation with the integers is  
very rich and if you assume your thoughts are just instances of  
digital computation then the appearance of the physical world can be  
explained in terms of them.


I don't show this. I show that if we assume mechanism, then we have to  
explained the physical world in term of integers/combinators/universal  
machine. I submit a problem. In fact I show that with mechanism, the  
mind-body problem becomes an arithmetical body problem. The interview  
of the machine gives hints of the solution.


Bruno


But this is a rather weak sense of 'explain', since it can also  
explain completely different worlds.


Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 9/25/2011 5:27 PM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 6:35 PM, meekerdb > wrote:


On 9/25/2011 11:28 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:

I mentioned QM only to mentioned a computer emulable theory of 
molecules.
I find quite possible that QM explains biochemistry, given the 
incredible theory
of chemistry the SWE equation allow (molecules and the electronic shape 
of atoms
is really what QM explains the most elegantly and successfully, but 
this is
besides my point).

But you are coherent: if you want materialism, you will need a non 
turing
emulable theory of matter, and of mind.
Good luck, because it needs already some amount of work to conceive 
something
not Turing emulable in math, and in physics, it is even more difficult.


But QM is based on complex numbers over the reals, which are already not 
Turing
emulable.


Has a real number ever been measured by any physicist?

Jason


Sure.  He measured one side of the right triangle to be 1cubit and the other side to be 
1cubit and concluded that the third side was sqrt(2)cubit.


Brent
"All measurement is theory burdened."

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 6:35 PM, meekerdb  wrote:

> On 9/25/2011 11:28 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:
>
>> I mentioned QM only to mentioned a computer emulable theory of molecules.
>> I find quite possible that QM explains biochemistry, given the incredible
>> theory of chemistry the SWE equation allow (molecules and the electronic
>> shape of atoms is really what QM explains the most elegantly and
>> successfully, but this is besides my point).
>>
>> But you are coherent: if you want materialism, you will need a non turing
>> emulable theory of matter, and of mind.
>> Good luck, because it needs already some amount of work to conceive
>> something not Turing emulable in math, and in physics, it is even more
>> difficult.
>>
>
> But QM is based on complex numbers over the reals, which are already not
> Turing emulable.
>
>
Has a real number ever been measured by any physicist?

Jason

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 9/25/2011 11:28 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:

I mentioned QM only to mentioned a computer emulable theory of molecules.
I find quite possible that QM explains biochemistry, given the incredible theory of 
chemistry the SWE equation allow (molecules and the electronic shape of atoms is really 
what QM explains the most elegantly and successfully, but this is besides my point).


But you are coherent: if you want materialism, you will need a non turing emulable 
theory of matter, and of mind.
Good luck, because it needs already some amount of work to conceive something not Turing 
emulable in math, and in physics, it is even more difficult.


But QM is based on complex numbers over the reals, which are already not Turing 
emulable.

Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 25 Sep 2011, at 09:05, Roger Granet wrote:


Bruno,

Hi.

>Roger:  When you say "Mathematical truth is in the mind of  
persons", this was the very point I was making.  I don't >think  
there can exist mathematical truths in some platonic realm  
somewhere.  They're in the mind, which is a physical >thing,


>This is something you assume. It is not obvious, and provably false  
if we assume that brains are Turing emulable at >some level such  
that we would survived through such an emulation. (this is not  
entirely obvious, and I explain this from >times to times on the  
list, but you can also take a look on the papers in my url).


Roger: I agree that this is an assumption; although, I'd say it's  
also an assumption that mathematical truths exist somewhere outside  
of all other physically existent things.


When a mathematician assume something, like (x ≠ y -> s(x) ≠ s(y),  
say. He is neutral on the interpretation of x, s(x), etc. So it is not  
part of the assumption made by the mathematician, that mathematical  
truth is in or outside some other object assumed, or not, by some  
other people.


In cognitive science, or in theology, we don't have to postulate that  
a mathematical truth, like "17 is prime" is outside of physical  
things. We might just NOT postulate physically existent thing. And  
remains agnostic on that question until further clarifications appear.







I realize now from later in your email that you also don't think  
these truths exist separate from all other physically existent  
things (?), but it seems like  many physicists and mathematicians do  
think they exist outside of all other physical things.



>I don't see how you answered this above. I do see that you assume a  
physical reality. But I don't see how you explain >the numbers from  
that, still less the mind.


Roger: While I admit explaining the numbers isn't the area I think  
about the most, it seems like if you have a set of existent states  
in which some intelligence developed, this intelligence would see  
the presence of a single existent state and could equate that to the  
number 1, the existence of another one next to it to a total of two,  
etc.?

~~



All right. But set of existent state already exists in many  
mathematical structures. You explain well how intelligence might  
develop from such state and BET on the presence of a single state, and  
conceptualize through it the idea of number 1. I don't see anything  
physical here.
You are using Aristotle idea that seeing is sort of proof of  
existence, a bit like animals are programmed to do (it pays in the  
short run). Platonist took distance with that idea. They better  
remember their dreams, I guess, so that they stop to consider that  
seeing, or measuring, observing, is a proof of existence. They take  
"seeing" as an opportunity to bet on something which would explain the  
seeing, and which is not necessarily made of what is seen.





>But biochemical activity is explained by quantum mechanics, which  
is Turing emulable, and so this, by the UDA result, >makes  
phsyicalism wrong. In fact QM can be (and, assuming we are machine,  
has to be) explained by addition and >multiplication. That has been  
partially done.   Contrariwise, nobody has been able to explain how  
consciousness can be >the product of anything described by third  
person notions.


Roger: But, many question whether or not  quantum mechanics is the  
one theory that can explain all of reality, so I'm not convinced  
that all biochemical activity is explained  by quantum mechanics.

~~


I mentioned QM only to mentioned a computer emulable theory of  
molecules.
I find quite possible that QM explains biochemistry, given the  
incredible theory of chemistry the SWE equation allow (molecules and  
the electronic shape of atoms is really what QM explains the most  
elegantly and successfully, but this is besides my point).


But you are coherent: if you want materialism, you will need a non  
turing emulable theory of matter, and of mind.
Good luck, because it needs already some amount of work to conceive  
something not Turing emulable in math, and in physics, it is even more  
difficult. But it is logically possible, and the study of computer  
science is the must, for those who hope to succeed in going beyond.  
But the universal machine is good in defeating such arguments, already.







>But that assumption is used commonly in physics. If "1+1=2" can be  
derived from physics, without assuming it, then >please show this to  
me. You might begin to give me a physical definition of what is 1,  
without assuming the usual >arithmetical meaning of 1.


Roger: I'm not clear how the existence of a single physical object/ 
existent state can't be described by an intelligence as the number 1.


I' not clear how the existence of a single biological organism/ 
existent state can't be described by an intelligence as the numb

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 24 Sep 2011, at 20:56, Jason Resch wrote:




On Sep 24, 2011, at 12:44 PM, meekerdb  wrote:


On 9/24/2011 12:07 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
A final consideration: do you believe Pi has such a value that  
when Euler's number is raised to the power of (2*Pi*i) the result  
is 1? Pi has a value which no human has determined, as determinig  
it requires infinite time and memory.  If only those mathematical  
things known to humans exist, then Pi's true value does not exist.


I think this is questionable.  One can use the value of pi,  
calculate with it, determine it's relation with other quantities.


We can use an approximation of it's value, or a definition of how to  
derive it's value (given infinite time and memory), but we've never  
known or used it's value.  All of it's definitions require  
infinities.  If these infinities don't exist, because your  
philosophy of mathematics is constructivist, then it follows that Pi  
does not exist.


Actually, finitists, constructivists and intuitionists have not so  
much problem with Pi, nor Euler's e and gamma, as those numbers are  
computable real numbers, and admit clean finite definition, and  
methods for handling them unambiguously. They have problem with the  
non constructive notion of arbitrary real number, or with non  
computable number. But then they have problem with any non solipistic  
account of reality. Brouwer, the founder of intuitionism would have  
said to his student that his philosophy makes them non existing, and  
that he was astonished they were interested in it (I don't know if  
this is a legend, or relate to something true).


This short remark makes not your point non valid, to be sure.

Bruno





So you can't write it's decimal expansion, how significant is that?


Sure everything is questionable.  But according to Rogers theory the  
unnown digits of Pi do not exist and/or have no definite value since  
no human has determined them.


What this equation and reasoning suggests is that there can be  
certain values which are unknown to us.  Such as the googolplexth  
digit of Pi.


Jason





Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 1:37 AM, Roger Granet  wrote:

> Jason,
>
> >Do you believe there exist an infinite number of integers?  If so I ask
> you why should these very large numbers exist if >they require a physical
> basis?  There are numbers we cannot physically coceive of by virtue of their
> size and the finite >size of the observable universe.  If these large
> numbers exist, they have no mental or physical existence here.
>
> Roger: I believe that a system exists in our minds that can abstractly
> produce an infinite number of integers as well as can conceive of the number
> pi.   There may really be an infinite number of non-mind things.  I think
> there probably are,  but we'll never be able to count them physically, so
> we'll never be 100% sure.
>

I agree.  In science we can never be 100% sure of anything.


>  There's a difference between saying that we can conceive of mathematical
> concepts in our minds and whether or not these abstract truths actually
> physically exist out there somewhere in this cavern of yours.
> ~
>

I don't know why you expect mathematical truth to have some kind of physical
existence, nor what form you would expect such a physical existence to take
(which is why I mentioned the caverns).


>
> >You ask us to point out the hidden cavern containing scribblings by god
> for all mathematical truth before you can accept >its human-independent
> existence.  But as a scientist do you believe the past exists?  How about
> the space beyond the >cosmologicsl horizon?  Other branches of the wave
> function? Other universes implied by string theory?  If so, why do >you
> believe in them when it is provably impossible for anyone to point them out
> for your eyes to see?
>
> Roger: I believe the past did exist but no longer does.  Do you believe it
> still exists in the here and now?
>

I believe the universe is four dimensional, as strongly implied by
relativity.  This implies that the you from 5 minutes ago exists 5
light-minutes away through the dimension of time.


>   I don't necessarilly believe in other universes, space beyond the
> cosmological horizon.   They may be there and they may not be.  Current
> evidence suggests they do exist, but as any scientist would say, we can't be
> sure until we can observe them more directly.
> ~
>

We may never observe them directly.  We infer them from our theories, just
like quarks (which have never been seen).  Our mathematical theories imply
the existence of things like integers.  While we will never receive 100%
certainty, why not (at least ambivalently) choose to bet on what is
suggested by our best theories?


>
> >You asked why it is that whatever serves as the basis of reality exisys
> rather than nothing.  Arithmatic truth such as the >pimality of 17, or the
> oddness of 9 cannot be any other way.  These perfectly clear statements
> about the numbers must >be either true or false, the status of the truth
> cannot be undefined or non-existent.  Or do you disagree?
>
> Roger:  Arithmetic truths "cannot be any other way"?
>

I don't see any way 17 could be composite.  Or that 9 could be even.  Do
you?


>Many people use this argument for promoting all kinds of views.   If you
> can provide more directly observable evidence of where these truths exist
> outside of all other physical things other than dogmatically repeating that
> they do exist,  I'd be more likely to agree with you.   Until then, I
> suggest that they don't exist outside of all other physical things, but I'll
> let more evidence convince me either way.
>

Have you ever considered that what you hold as the supreme example of
existence, the physical universe, might be a mathematical object?  Could
observers existing in that mathematical version of the universe ever decide
if their existence was in a mathematical, rather than a physical universe?
What difference could there be between them?  Assuming mathematical
existence is a simpler theory than believing both mathematical universes and
physical universes exist.

Further, it offers explains for both quantum mechanics, and why our universe
is able to support life.  While this may not be enough to convince you it is
true, it should at least convince you to take the idea seriously.


>
>
> Roger
>
>
>
There were a few questions you missed which would help me understand your
position more clearly:

If 17 has not always been prime, at what point do you think it become
prime?  During the big bang, when the 17-year cicada evolved, when humans
began to count, when Euclid wrote about them, when mathematicians agreed
upon a set of axioms, or at some other period?

Do you think the 10^100th digit of Pi has a certain value, despite our
ignorance of it?

Thanks,

Jason

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Roger Granet]

Bruno,

    Hi.  

>Roger:  When you say "Mathematical truth is in the mind of persons", this was 
>the very point I was making.  I don't >think there can exist mathematical 
>truths in some platonic realm somewhere.  They're in the mind, which is a 
>physical >thing,

>This is something you assume. It is not obvious, and provably false if we 
>assume that brains are Turing emulable at >some level such that we would 
>survived through such an emulation. (this is not entirely obvious, and I 
>explain this from >times to times on the list, but you can also take a look on 
>the papers in my url).

Roger: I agree that this is an assumption; although, I'd say it's also an 
assumption that mathematical truths exist somewhere outside of all other 
physically existent things.   I realize now from later in your email that you 
also don't think these truths exist separate from all other physically existent 
things (?), but it seems like  many physicists and mathematicians do think they 
exist outside of all other physical things.  


>I don't see how you answered this above. I do see that you assume a physical 
>reality. But I don't see how you explain >the numbers from that, still less 
>the mind.


Roger: While I admit explaining the numbers isn't the area I think about the 
most, it seems like if you have a set of existent states in which some 
intelligence developed, this intelligence would see the presence of a single 
existent state and could equate that to the number 1, the existence of another 
one next to it to a total of two, etc.?  
~~

>But biochemical activity is explained by quantum mechanics, which is Turing 
>emulable, and so this, by the UDA result, >makes phsyicalism wrong. In fact QM 
>can be (and, assuming we are machine, has to be) explained by addition and 
>>multiplication. That has been partially done.   Contrariwise, nobody has been 
>able to explain how consciousness can be >the product of anything described by 
>third person notions.

Roger: But, many question whether or not  quantum mechanics is the one theory 
that can explain all of reality, so I'm not convinced that all biochemical 
activity is explained  by quantum mechanics.
~~

>But that assumption is used commonly in physics. If "1+1=2" can be derived 
>from physics, without assuming it, then >please show this to me. You might 
>begin to give me a physical definition of what is 1, without assuming the 
>usual >arithmetical meaning of 1.

Roger: I'm not clear how the existence of a single physical object/existent 
state can't be described by an intelligence as the number 1.   Then the 
existence of another object next to it, and that intelligence can get 1+1=2.  
But, I'd agree that you need the intelligence to make up this addition system.  
 I guess where we disagree is in that I think intelligence/mind is entirely 
made of these physical objects, and you don't?

    Overall, thanks for all the interesting things to think about in my 
physical brain! :-)

Roger 

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Roger Granet]

Jason,
    
>Do you believe there exist an infinite number of integers?  If so I ask you 
>why should these very large numbers exist if >they require a physical basis?  
>There are numbers we cannot physically coceive of by virtue of their size and 
>the finite >size of the observable universe.  If these large numbers exist, 
>they have no mental or physical existence here.

Roger: I believe that a system exists in our minds that can abstractly produce 
an infinite number of integers as well as can conceive of the number pi.   
There may really be an infinite number of non-mind things.  I think there 
probably are,  but we'll never be able to count them physically, so we'll never 
be 100% sure.  There's a difference between saying that we can conceive of 
mathematical concepts in our minds and whether or not these abstract truths 
actually physically exist out there somewhere in this cavern of yours.  
~

>You ask us to point out the hidden cavern containing scribblings by god for 
>all mathematical truth before you can accept >its human-independent existence. 
> But as a scientist do you believe the past exists?  How about the space 
>beyond the >cosmologicsl horizon?  Other branches of the wave function? Other 
>universes implied by string theory?  If so, why do >you believe in them when 
>it is provably impossible for anyone to point them out for your eyes to see?

Roger: I believe the past did exist but no longer does.  Do you believe it 
still exists in the here and now?   I don't necessarilly believe in other 
universes, space beyond the cosmological horizon.   They may be there and they 
may not be.  Current evidence suggests they do exist, but as any scientist 
would say, we can't be sure until we can observe them more directly.
~

>You asked why it is that whatever serves as the basis of reality exisys rather 
>than nothing.  Arithmatic truth such as the >pimality of 17, or the oddness of 
>9 cannot be any other way.  These perfectly clear statements about the numbers 
>must >be either true or false, the status of the truth cannot be undefined or 
>non-existent.  Or do you disagree?

Roger:  Arithmetic truths "cannot be any other way"?    Many people use this 
argument for promoting all kinds of views.   If you can provide more directly 
observable evidence of where these truths exist outside of all other physical 
things other than dogmatically repeating that they do exist,  I'd be more 
likely to agree with you.   Until then, I suggest that they don't exist outside 
of all other physical things, but I'll let more evidence convince me either 
way.   

Roger 

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 9/24/2011 6:34 PM, Jason Resch wrote:


I said explicitly that "exist" means to be in the ontology of some model, 
and so it
is always relative to that model (and similarly for nonexistent).


Bruno's shown how the physical world is part of the same model that includes 
the integers.


I don't think so. He has shown that computation with the integers is very rich and if you 
assume your thoughts are just instances of digital computation then the appearance of the 
physical world can be explained in terms of them.  But this is a rather weak sense of 
'explain', since it can also explain completely different worlds.


Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Sat, Sep 24, 2011 at 5:56 PM, meekerdb  wrote:

>  On 9/24/2011 1:54 PM, Jason Resch wrote:
>
>
>
> On Sat, Sep 24, 2011 at 2:22 PM, meekerdb  wrote:
>
>> On 9/24/2011 11:56 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sep 24, 2011, at 12:44 PM, meekerdb  wrote:
>>>
>>>  On 9/24/2011 12:07 AM, Jason Resch wrote:

> A final consideration: do you believe Pi has such a value that when
> Euler's number is raised to the power of (2*Pi*i) the result is 1? Pi has 
> a
> value which no human has determined, as determinig it requires infinite 
> time
> and memory.  If only those mathematical things known to humans exist, then
> Pi's true value does not exist.
>

 I think this is questionable.  One can use the value of pi, calculate
 with it, determine it's relation with other quantities.

>>>
>>> We can use an approximation of it's value, or a definition of how to
>>> derive it's value (given infinite time and memory), but we've never known or
>>> used it's value.
>>>
>>
>>  Sure we do:  sin(pi/4) = 1/sqrt(2)  uses the value.  So does e^(i*pi) =
>> -1.
>
>
> There we are using its definition or an approximation of its value.  If you
> plug e^(Pi*i) into google, you get 1 but that is because the limited
> precision that computers use to represent floating point numbers gets
> rounded.  For proof, try entering into google:
> e^(Pi*i+1E-9)
>
> The function Sine and the number e are both defined by an infinite series,
>
>
> You have too narrow a view of mathematics.  Infinite series are one way
> sine and e can be defined, but not the only ones.
>


I'm not aware of any definitions of them which do not involve infinity
directly, or otherwise infinite objects, or infinite numbers of objects.

E.g., you could say e = ( 1 + (1 / infinity) ) ^ infinity, which uses
infinity directly.


>
>
>  which have likewise never been physically realized.  You can either
> dispense with the infinities, or dispense with the idea that math is
> man-made.
>
>
>>
>>
>>
>>  All of it's definitions require infinities.
>>>
>>
>>  The circumference of a circle whose diameter is 1.
>
>
> A circle's definition involves an infinite number of points having the same
> distance from a center.  There has never been a physical construction or
> representation of a circle.
>
>
> Neither has there been of the number 2.  All physical realizations are only
> approximately described by mathematics.
>
>
This only reinforces my point.  If we can only approximate objects
mathematics, then how can it be a human construction?


>
>
>
>>
>>
>>  If these infinities don't exist, because your philosophy of mathematics
>>> is constructivist, then it follows that Pi does not exist.
>>>
>>
>>  In one (of the many) senses of "exist".
>>
>>
> The two senses I have seen you have articulate are the one in which
> existence implies you can interact with something (your chair), and the
> sense in which you cannot interact with it (numbers, past, beyond horizon,
> etc.).
>
>
> I said explicitly that "exist" means to be in the ontology of some model,
> and so it is always relative to that model (and similarly for nonexistent).
>
>
Bruno's shown how the physical world is part of the same model that includes
the integers.



>
>  This view of existence seems rather egocentric;
>
>
> It's not egocentric if other people share the same model.
>
>
A bunch of different people each individually believing that only the here
and now (to each of them) is real.  Each will have a different view of the
here and now, and each will be wrong in denying the existence of what the
here and now happens to be for other people in other places.


>
>  I don't see how the existence or non existence of something can depend on
> one person's point of view.  There are billions of people on this planet I
> will never meet, see, or know, but I should not consider their existence to
> be a different sense of the word.
>
>
>>
>>
>>>  So you can't write it's decimal expansion, how significant is that?

>>>
>>> Sure everything is questionable.  But according to Rogers theory the
>>> unnown digits of Pi do not exist and/or have no definite value since no
>>> human has determined them.
>>>
>>> What this equation and reasoning suggests is that there can be certain
>>> values which are unknown to us.  Such as the googolplexth digit of Pi.
>>>
>>
>>  I'd say almost all (in the measure theoretic sense) values are unknown to
>> us.
>>
>
> So is it fair to say you believe there are an infinite number of primes?
>
>
> Yes, as defined in arithmetic.
>
>
>
Then your philosophy of mathematics differs from Roger's.  You accept the
existence of primes not yet known by humans, and primes so big we never
could know them.


>
>
>>
>> Brent
>> "By habit, whenever a man sees a name, he is led to figure
>> himself a corresponding object."
>>  --- Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
>>
>>
> "You can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but
> when you're finis

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 9/24/2011 1:54 PM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Sat, Sep 24, 2011 at 2:22 PM, meekerdb > wrote:


On 9/24/2011 11:56 AM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Sep 24, 2011, at 12:44 PM, meekerdb mailto:meeke...@verizon.net>> wrote:

On 9/24/2011 12:07 AM, Jason Resch wrote:

A final consideration: do you believe Pi has such a value that 
when
Euler's number is raised to the power of (2*Pi*i) the result is 
1? Pi
has a value which no human has determined, as determinig it 
requires
infinite time and memory.  If only those mathematical things 
known to
humans exist, then Pi's true value does not exist.


I think this is questionable.  One can use the value of pi, 
calculate with
it, determine it's relation with other quantities.


We can use an approximation of it's value, or a definition of how to 
derive it's
value (given infinite time and memory), but we've never known or used 
it's value.


Sure we do:  sin(pi/4) = 1/sqrt(2)  uses the value.  So does e^(i*pi) = -1.


There we are using its definition or an approximation of its value.  If you plug 
e^(Pi*i) into google, you get 1 but that is because the limited precision that computers 
use to represent floating point numbers gets rounded.  For proof, try entering into google:

e^(Pi*i+1E-9)

The function Sine and the number e are both defined by an infinite series,


You have too narrow a view of mathematics.  Infinite series are one way sine and e can be 
defined, but not the only ones.


which have likewise never been physically realized.  You can either dispense with the 
infinities, or dispense with the idea that math is man-made.





All of it's definitions require infinities.


The circumference of a circle whose diameter is 1.


A circle's definition involves an infinite number of points having the same distance 
from a center.  There has never been a physical construction or representation of a circle.


Neither has there been of the number 2.  All physical realizations are only approximately 
described by mathematics.





If these infinities don't exist, because your philosophy of mathematics 
is
constructivist, then it follows that Pi does not exist.


In one (of the many) senses of "exist".


The two senses I have seen you have articulate are the one in which existence implies 
you can interact with something (your chair), and the sense in which you cannot interact 
with it (numbers, past, beyond horizon, etc.).


I said explicitly that "exist" means to be in the ontology of some model, and so it is 
always relative to that model (and similarly for nonexistent).



This view of existence seems rather egocentric;


It's not egocentric if other people share the same model.

I don't see how the existence or non existence of something can depend on one person's 
point of view.  There are billions of people on this planet I will never meet, see, or 
know, but I should not consider their existence to be a different sense of the word.




So you can't write it's decimal expansion, how significant is that?


Sure everything is questionable.  But according to Rogers theory the 
unnown
digits of Pi do not exist and/or have no definite value since no human 
has
determined them.

What this equation and reasoning suggests is that there can be certain 
values
which are unknown to us.  Such as the googolplexth digit of Pi.


I'd say almost all (in the measure theoretic sense) values are unknown to 
us.


So is it fair to say you believe there are an infinite number of primes?


Yes, as defined in arithmetic.



Brent
"By habit, whenever a man sees a name, he is led to figure
himself a corresponding object."
 --- Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)


"You can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but when you're 
finished, you'll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird... So let's look at the 
bird and see what it's doing — that's what counts. *I learned very early the difference 
between knowing the name of something and knowing something.*" -- Richard Feynmann


We might know the name "17" or the name "Pi", but we should not let these simple labels 
fool us into thinking we know everything there is to know about these objects.


But note that Feynmann new how to use pi...without knowing it's decimal expansion or 
having any other infinite amount of knowledge.


Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Sat, Sep 24, 2011 at 2:22 PM, meekerdb  wrote:

> On 9/24/2011 11:56 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On Sep 24, 2011, at 12:44 PM, meekerdb  wrote:
>>
>>  On 9/24/2011 12:07 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
>>>
 A final consideration: do you believe Pi has such a value that when
 Euler's number is raised to the power of (2*Pi*i) the result is 1? Pi has a
 value which no human has determined, as determinig it requires infinite 
 time
 and memory.  If only those mathematical things known to humans exist, then
 Pi's true value does not exist.

>>>
>>> I think this is questionable.  One can use the value of pi, calculate
>>> with it, determine it's relation with other quantities.
>>>
>>
>> We can use an approximation of it's value, or a definition of how to
>> derive it's value (given infinite time and memory), but we've never known or
>> used it's value.
>>
>
> Sure we do:  sin(pi/4) = 1/sqrt(2)  uses the value.  So does e^(i*pi) = -1.


There we are using its definition or an approximation of its value.  If you
plug e^(Pi*i) into google, you get 1 but that is because the limited
precision that computers use to represent floating point numbers gets
rounded.  For proof, try entering into google:
e^(Pi*i+1E-9)

The function Sine and the number e are both defined by an infinite series,
which have likewise never been physically realized.  You can either dispense
with the infinities, or dispense with the idea that math is man-made.


>
>
>
>  All of it's definitions require infinities.
>>
>
> The circumference of a circle whose diameter is 1.


A circle's definition involves an infinite number of points having the same
distance from a center.  There has never been a physical construction or
representation of a circle.


>
>
>  If these infinities don't exist, because your philosophy of mathematics is
>> constructivist, then it follows that Pi does not exist.
>>
>
> In one (of the many) senses of "exist".
>
>
The two senses I have seen you have articulate are the one in which
existence implies you can interact with something (your chair), and the
sense in which you cannot interact with it (numbers, past, beyond horizon,
etc.).  This view of existence seems rather egocentric; I don't see how the
existence or non existence of something can depend on one person's point of
view.  There are billions of people on this planet I will never meet, see,
or know, but I should not consider their existence to be a different sense
of the word.


>
>
>>  So you can't write it's decimal expansion, how significant is that?
>>>
>>
>> Sure everything is questionable.  But according to Rogers theory the
>> unnown digits of Pi do not exist and/or have no definite value since no
>> human has determined them.
>>
>> What this equation and reasoning suggests is that there can be certain
>> values which are unknown to us.  Such as the googolplexth digit of Pi.
>>
>
> I'd say almost all (in the measure theoretic sense) values are unknown to
> us.
>

So is it fair to say you believe there are an infinite number of primes?


>
> Brent
> "By habit, whenever a man sees a name, he is led to figure
> himself a corresponding object."
>  --- Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)
>
>
"You can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but when
you're finished, you'll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird...
So let's look at the bird and see what it's doing — that's what counts. *I
learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and
knowing something.*" -- Richard Feynmann

We might know the name "17" or the name "Pi", but we should not let these
simple labels fool us into thinking we know everything there is to know
about these objects.

Jason

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 9/24/2011 11:56 AM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Sep 24, 2011, at 12:44 PM, meekerdb  wrote:


On 9/24/2011 12:07 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
A final consideration: do you believe Pi has such a value that when Euler's number is 
raised to the power of (2*Pi*i) the result is 1? Pi has a value which no human has 
determined, as determinig it requires infinite time and memory.  If only those 
mathematical things known to humans exist, then Pi's true value does not exist.


I think this is questionable.  One can use the value of pi, calculate with it, 
determine it's relation with other quantities.


We can use an approximation of it's value, or a definition of how to derive it's value 
(given infinite time and memory), but we've never known or used it's value. 


Sure we do:  sin(pi/4) = 1/sqrt(2)  uses the value.  So does e^(i*pi) = -1.


All of it's definitions require infinities. 


The circumference of a circle whose diameter is 1.

If these infinities don't exist, because your philosophy of mathematics is 
constructivist, then it follows that Pi does not exist.


In one (of the many) senses of "exist".




So you can't write it's decimal expansion, how significant is that?


Sure everything is questionable.  But according to Rogers theory the unnown digits of Pi 
do not exist and/or have no definite value since no human has determined them.


What this equation and reasoning suggests is that there can be certain values which are 
unknown to us.  Such as the googolplexth digit of Pi.


I'd say almost all (in the measure theoretic sense) values are unknown to us.

Brent
"By habit, whenever a man sees a name, he is led to figure
himself a corresponding object."
  --- Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Sep 24, 2011, at 12:44 PM, meekerdb  wrote:


On 9/24/2011 12:07 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
A final consideration: do you believe Pi has such a value that when  
Euler's number is raised to the power of (2*Pi*i) the result is 1?  
Pi has a value which no human has determined, as determinig it  
requires infinite time and memory.  If only those mathematical  
things known to humans exist, then Pi's true value does not exist.


I think this is questionable.  One can use the value of pi,  
calculate with it, determine it's relation with other quantities.


We can use an approximation of it's value, or a definition of how to  
derive it's value (given infinite time and memory), but we've never  
known or used it's value.  All of it's definitions require  
infinities.  If these infinities don't exist, because your philosophy  
of mathematics is constructivist, then it follows that Pi does not  
exist.



So you can't write it's decimal expansion, how significant is that?


Sure everything is questionable.  But according to Rogers theory the  
unnown digits of Pi do not exist and/or have no definite value since  
no human has determined them.


What this equation and reasoning suggests is that there can be certain  
values which are unknown to us.  Such as the googolplexth digit of Pi.


Jason





Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 9/24/2011 12:07 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
A final consideration: do you believe Pi has such a value that when Euler's number is 
raised to the power of (2*Pi*i) the result is 1?  Pi has a value which no human has 
determined, as determinig it requires infinite time and memory.  If only those 
mathematical things known to humans exist, then Pi's true value does not exist.


I think this is questionable.  One can use the value of pi, calculate with it, determine 
it's relation with other quantities.  So you can't write it's decimal expansion, how 
significant is that?


Brent

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 24 Sep 2011, at 08:12, Roger Granet wrote:


Bruno,

Hi.  My responses are:

>Mathematical truth is in the mind of persons. And assuming we are  
machine, mathematical truth is in the mind >of numbers relatively to  
numbers. Of course we have to assume all elementary arithmetical  
truth, like "17 is >

Roger:  When you say "Mathematical truth is in the mind of persons",  
this was the very point I was making.  I don't think there can exist  
mathematical truths in some platonic realm somewhere.  They're in  
the mind, which is a physical thing,


This is something you assume. It is not obvious, and provably false if  
we assume that brains are Turing emulable at some level such that we  
would survived through such an emulation. (this is not entirely  
obvious, and I explain this from times to times on the list, but you  
can also take a look on the papers in my url).




and humans created them as a way of describing physical things.   
But, as you know, many physicists and others think that mathematical  
and physical laws exist independent of all else.  When they can show  
us where they exist, I'll be willing to accept their argument.


But why do you want that if something exists implies it exists  
somewhere? This is assuming physicalism, which has been shown  
incompatible with mechanism.




  I'm not sure where you're getting that I don't accept truths like  
"17 is prime".


Where did I say that. On the contrary I was just asking you the  
question.





I didn't say that.


I didn't say that you did it.


All I'm saying is that these truths don't have independent existence  
outside of everything else that exists.


I agree with that statement also, but I guess for a diametrical  
reason. Mechanism makes not just physicalism false, it makes this in a  
constructive way: it explains where the appearance of the physical  
reality comes from. So by assuming things easy things like the laws of  
addition and multiplication of the natural numbers, we can explain  
where both the quanta and the qualia arise. To explain the numbers  
from physics does not work, if only because all physical theory has to  
assume the numbers (which of course is almost never made explicit by  
the physicists).




 If the truths exist, they're just one part of the overall set of  
existent things that is what we're all trying to figure out.

~~~

>To ask that a number should be somewhere is a category error.  
Numbers are not space-time object. It means >also that you assume  
space and time, which is a more complex notion than numbers.


Roger: See above.
~


I don't see how you answered this above. I do see that you assume a  
physical reality. But I don't see how you explain the numbers from  
that, still less the mind.







>So, while nobody can disprove the existence of these things, we  
can't really do much with them either it seems >to me.  There just  
more of the things people claim to exist but can provide no evidence  
for.  However, I admit >that I can also never directly prove my  
ideas about what used to be called "non-existence" because no person  
>or minds would be present there.  All we can do is use our  
unprovable, but hopefully logical, hypotheses to >build internally  
consistent models that are consistent with known facts and that  
eventually can make testable >predictions.   This is where I want to  
work towards because otherwise, it's all just talk.


>OK. But then you have to build a sufficiently precise theory, so  
that we can criticize it. The problem with >nothingness is that it  
is, a priori, just a word, indeed, and to make it precise requires  
some theory. For example, >the quantum vacuum needs the quantum  
theory. The empty set needs set theory, 0 needs number theory, etc.


Roger:  This is what I just said in the comment you were responding  
to.

~


I know. We agree on that. But then you seem to derive from this that a  
physical reality exist *primitively*, and that we have to assume time  
and space, etc. Then what I say, is that for such a physicalism/ 
materialism to be true, you need to make brain and mind both  
substantial and infinite.





>In regards to consciousness, I feel pretty much the same.   
Consciousness is just the output of all the neurons, >neural  
circuits, ion gradients, etc. in your brain.


>This is extremely ambiguous. But from the UDP (the universal  
dovetailer proof), or UDA UD Argument, >either the neurons, neural  
circuits, ion gradients, etc. in your brain, are Turing emulable,  
and in this case >physicalism is refuted, or there are not, in which  
case you are developing a non mechanist theory (which is >something  
I respect, although I expect such theories to be very complex one,  
and quite different from >everything we know from observation and  
logic).


Roger: How is this ambiguous?  No one yet knows exactly the  
biochemical mechanisms that produce consciousness, but it's clea

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 23 Sep 2011, at 19:13, Pzomby wrote:




On Sep 23, 8:41 am, Bruno Marchal  wrote:

Hi Roger,

On 23 Sep 2011, at 07:37, Roger Granet wrote:


Bruno,



Hi.  Yes, I am pretty much a materialist/physicalist.


So, you cannot defend the idea that the brain (or whatever  
responsible

for our consciousness) is Turing emulable. OK?



Bruno:

When you state “that the brain (or whatever responsible for our
consciousness) is Turing emulable”…in using the term Turing “emulable”
do you mean that the brain is being imitated, is represented, is an
instantiation, or something stronger such as the Turing machine
actually having inducted number properties of “encoded” information.

Could you clarify why the term Turing “emulable” is used and not
Turing “represented” or Turing “instantiated” or even Turing
“encoded”?


That's an important but not so easy question to answer, especially  
without digging a bit in the computer science (and it is hard for me  
to guess what you already know about computer), but I will try to do  
my best.


Emulation means "exact simulation". That concept makes sense in the  
digital world, for digital processes (although many have attempted to  
extend it on a variety of analog devices).


People like Post and Turing have discovered a universal machine or  
universal program. Such a program is able to emulate the work of any  
other program. So we can say that a (general purpose) computer is also  
a universal emulator (leaving open if such a machine can even emulate  
just one physical process: in fact comp entails that a computer cannot  
emulate *any* physical processes, despite it can simulate them quite  
well, at least for short period).


The brain functioning, or a physical computer functioning is a  
physical process, and *as such* is not emulable by computers.
But a computer computes, and *that* function is emulable by any other  
computer.


Let me give an example. If you write a program computing the  
factorial, when you execute it on a computer, the computer will go  
through a discrete sequence of step, ending up with the result of some  
factorial in some register. Now, any other computer, including humans,  
can emulate that digital process, that is do exactly the same  
computation, going through the same equivalent step (with a very  
narrow notion of equivalence). A human can emulate this with pencil  
and papers, for example. This does not mean that a human can emulate  
the physical working of a physical von Neumann computer: not only he  
will not have the time to emulate the quantum wave responsible for the  
stability of the atoms of the von Neuman physical machine, but he  
cannot probably emulate the infinity of worlds that such a wave really  
describe. So when we say that a computer emulate some machine, it is  
always with respect to what such a machine is supposed to be doing.  
This is the reason why, with comp, we have to make explicit that an  
artificial brain emulate a real brain, at the level here we suppose  
the real brain acting like a computer. Comp assumes that such a level  
exist. Once such a level is chosen, by the notion of universality, we  
can choose any computer for doing that task, with silicon, or with  
water, air, pebbles, whatever.


The term "emulable" is used, to remind us, that it means simulable in  
some exact way, which makes sense for the digital process.  
"Instantiate" is not bad, but is a more general term. If a Toby is  
ferocious, he can instantiate a ferocious dog, but you would not say  
that he can simulate a ferocious dog exactly. But "instanciate" is OK.  
In some context, representation can be used too, but the term can also  
have less precise, and more precise, meaning according to the context.  
It is usually more statical, less dynamical, than simulation and  
emulation. Encoded, is a bit too much precise, and is also rather  
statical. You can encoded data in a computer, but if you cannot encode  
a computation, unless you do meta-programming, and handle a program  
which manipulate a representation of some computation.


For a (crucial) example, Arithmetical truth does both. It emulates  
computations (meaning that the "natural" true relation between numbers  
does exact simulation of the dynamical evolution of computers, with  
digital time emulated by the successor function, but it encoded also  
the (finite) pieces of computations (which become statical, like *one*  
number). Consciousness supervenes on the computations, but not on the  
encoding of computations, which are merely description of computation,  
a bit like a movie can describe some happening, but is different from  
the happening itself.


For those who knows the phi_i, this can be made more clear. let phi_0,  
phi_1, phi_2, ... be an enumeration of the computable functions. Let  
phi_i(j)^s be the sth step of the computation of phi_i on argument j.  
A computation can be described by the sequence phi_i(j)^0, phi_i(j)^1,  
phi_i(j)^2, p

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Sep 24, 2011, at 1:12 AM, Roger Granet  wrote:


Bruno,

Hi.  My responses are:

>Mathematical truth is in the mind of persons. And assuming we are  
machine, mathematical truth is in the mind >of numbers relatively to  
numbers. Of course we have to assume all elementary arithmetical  
truth, like "17 is >

Roger:  When you say "Mathematical truth is in the mind of persons",  
this was the very point I was making.  I don't think there can exist  
mathematical truths in some platonic realm somewhere.  They're in  
the mind, which is a physical thing, and humans created them as a  
way of describing physical things.  But, as you know, many  
physicists and others think that mathematical and physical laws  
exist independent of all else.  When they can show us where they  
exist, I'll be willing to accept their argument.


In the same way an idea of a chair is not the same thing as a chair.   
The number 17 is not the same thing as any human's conception of it.   
Regarding this object we call 17 I ask you at what point it became  
prime?


Do you believe there exist an infinite number of integers?  If so I  
ask you why should these very large numbers exist if they require a  
physical basis?  There are numbers we cannot physically coceive of by  
virtue of their size and the finite size of the observable universe.   
If these large numbers exist, they have no mental or physical  
existence here.


A final consideration: do you believe Pi has such a value that when  
Euler's number is raised to the power of (2*Pi*i) the result is 1?  Pi  
has a value which no human has determined, as determinig it requires  
infinite time and memory.  If only those mathematical things known to  
humans exist, then Pi's true value does not exist.


You ask us to point out the hidden cavern containing scribblings by  
god for all mathematical truth before you can accept its human- 
independent existence.  But as a scientist do you believe the past  
exists?  How about the space beyond the cosmologicsl horizon?  Other  
branches of the wave function? Other universes implied by string  
theory?  If so, why do you believe in them when it is provably  
impossible for anyone to point them out for your eyes to see?


You asked why it is that whatever serves as the basis of reality  
exisys rather than nothing.  Arithmatic truth such as the pimality of  
17, or the oddness of 9 cannot be any other way.  These perfectly  
clear statements about the numbers must be either true or false, the  
status of the truth cannot be undefined or non-existent.  Or do you  
disagree?


Thanks,

Jason

  I'm not sure where you're getting that I don't accept truths like  
"17 is prime".  I didn't say that.  All I'm saying is that these  
truths don't have independent existence outside of everything else  
that exists.  If the truths exist, they're just one part of the  
overall set of existent things that is what we're all trying to  
figure out.

~~~

>To ask that a number should be somewhere is a category error.  
Numbers are not space-time object. It means >also that you assume  
space and time, which is a more complex notion than numbers.


Roger: See above.
~

>So, while nobody can disprove the existence of these things, we  
can't really do much with them either it seems >to me.  There just  
more of the things people claim to exist but can provide no evidence  
for.  However, I admit >that I can also never directly prove my  
ideas about what used to be called "non-existence" because no person  
>or minds would be present there.  All we can do is use our  
unprovable, but hopefully logical, hypotheses to >build internally  
consistent models that are consistent with known facts and that  
eventually can make testable >predictions.   This is where I want to  
work towards because otherwise, it's all just talk.


>OK. But then you have to build a sufficiently precise theory, so  
that we can criticize it. The problem with >nothingness is that it  
is, a priori, just a word, indeed, and to make it precise requires  
some theory. For example, >the quantum vacuum needs the quantum  
theory. The empty set needs set theory, 0 needs number theory, etc.


Roger:  This is what I just said in the comment you were responding  
to.

~

>In regards to consciousness, I feel pretty much the same.   
Consciousness is just the output of all the neurons, >neural  
circuits, ion gradients, etc. in your brain.


>This is extremely ambiguous. But from the UDP (the universal  
dovetailer proof), or UDA UD Argument, >either the neurons, neural  
circuits, ion gradients, etc. in your brain, are Turing emulable,  
and in this case >physicalism is refuted, or there are not, in which  
case you are developing a non mechanist theory (which is >something  
I respect, although I expect such theories to be very complex one,  
and quite different from >everything we know from observation and  
logic).


Roger: How is this

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Roger Granet]

Bruno,

    Hi.  My responses are:

>Mathematical truth is in the mind of persons. And assuming we are machine, 
>mathematical truth is in the mind >of numbers relatively to numbers. Of course 
>we have to assume all elementary arithmetical truth, like "17 is >you doubt them?

Roger:  When you say "Mathematical truth is in the mind of persons", this was 
the very point I was making.  I don't think there can exist mathematical truths 
in some platonic realm somewhere.  They're in the mind, which is a physical 
thing, and humans created them as a way of describing physical things.  But, as 
you know, many physicists and others think that mathematical and physical laws 
exist independent of all else.  When they can show us where they exist, I'll be 
willing to accept their argument.   I'm not sure where you're getting that I 
don't accept truths like "17 is prime".  I didn't say that.  All I'm saying is 
that these truths don't have independent existence outside of everything else 
that exists.  If the truths exist, they're just one part of the overall set of 
existent things that is what we're all trying to figure out.
~~~

>To ask that a number should be somewhere is a category error. Numbers are not 
>space-time object. It means >also that you assume space and time, which is a 
>more complex notion than numbers. 

Roger: See above. 
~

>So, while nobody can disprove the existence of these things, we can't really 
>do much with them either it seems >to me.  There just more of the things 
>people claim to exist but can provide no evidence for.  However, I admit >that 
>I can also never directly prove my ideas about what used to be called 
>"non-existence" because no person >or minds would be present there.  All we 
>can do is use our unprovable, but hopefully logical, hypotheses to >build 
>internally consistent models that are consistent with known facts and that 
>eventually can make testable >predictions.   This is where I want to work 
>towards because otherwise, it's all just talk.

>OK. But then you have to build a sufficiently precise theory, so that we can 
>criticize it. The problem with >nothingness is that it is, a priori, just a 
>word, indeed, and to make it precise requires some theory. For example, >the 
>quantum vacuum needs the quantum theory. The empty set needs set theory, 0 
>needs number theory, etc.

Roger:  This is what I just said in the comment you were responding to.  
~

>In regards to consciousness, I feel pretty much the same.  Consciousness is 
>just the output of all the neurons, >neural circuits, ion gradients, etc. in 
>your brain.

>This is extremely ambiguous. But from the UDP (the universal dovetailer 
>proof), or UDA UD Argument, >either the neurons, neural circuits, ion 
>gradients, etc. in your brain, are Turing emulable, and in this case 
>>physicalism is refuted, or there are not, in which case you are developing a 
>non mechanist theory (which is >something I respect, although I expect such 
>theories to be very complex one, and quite different from >everything we know 
>from observation and logic). 

Roger: How is this ambiguous?  No one yet knows exactly the biochemical 
mechanisms that produce consciousness, but it's clear to most biochemists, at 
least, that consciousness is a product of the physical stuff inside the head. 
~~~

>Again, if it's something else, I'd say: Show me where this consciousness/mind 
>is that's not in the brain.


>It belongs, assuming mechanism, to the infinite number relations that you can 
>derive from addition and >multiplication alone. 

Roger: Hmm


>For trying to think of why there is something rather than nothing, I don't 
>think there can be any postulated >conscious observer other than some physical 
>property intrinsic to whatever existent state we're considering. > >Otherwise, 
>that doesn't explain where the observer comes from.

>I am afraid you are begging the question by assuming something physical. Where 
>does *that* come from. >What is it.  Mechanism can explain were both 
>matter/space/time, and subjectivity arise come from. They are >derived from 
>the addition and multiplication laws of natural numbers. The origin is not 
>direct, nor physical in >any sense, but is made possible by the 
>self-referential ability that some numbers display. The details of that 
>>explanation needs some amount of theoretical computer science. But the 
>argument showing the incompatibility >of mechanism and weak materialism (the 
>doctrine saying that primitive matter exists) is accessible to anyone >with 
>enough patience + a passive understanding of Church thesis.

>You might try to understand the 8 steps proof given 
>>here http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/publications/SANE2004MARCHALAbstract.html

Roger: I  don't have time to read your whole paper, but from near the 
beginning, it looks like it's based on the comp idea which assumes arithmetical 
realism:

"This i

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Pzomby]

On Sep 23, 8:41 am, Bruno Marchal  wrote:
> Hi Roger,
>
> On 23 Sep 2011, at 07:37, Roger Granet wrote:
>
> > Bruno,
>
> >     Hi.  Yes, I am pretty much a materialist/physicalist.
>
> So, you cannot defend the idea that the brain (or whatever responsible  
> for our consciousness) is Turing emulable. OK?
>

Bruno:

When you state “that the brain (or whatever responsible for our
consciousness) is Turing emulable”…in using the term Turing “emulable”
do you mean that the brain is being imitated, is represented, is an
instantiation, or something stronger such as the Turing machine
actually having inducted number properties of “encoded” information.

Could you clarify why the term Turing “emulable” is used and not
Turing “represented” or Turing “instantiated” or even Turing
“encoded”?


Thanks

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

hesis.

You might try to understand the 8 steps proof given here:
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/publications/SANE2004MARCHALAbstract.html




Thanks.


You are welcome,

Bruno



From: Bruno Marchal 
To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 1:02 PM
Subject: Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

Roger,

Your theory is still physicalism in disguise. You can't explain  
consciousness from that.
I will ask you what is your theory of consciousness, before giving  
more detail on this.


Your notion of 'nothing' is vague.

You might dig a little bit on mathematical logic: it has been proved  
that if you don't postulate the natural numbers, then you cannot  
derive the existence of them. So, unless you defend a form of  
physical ultrafinitism, your theory cannot account for the existence  
of 1, 2, 3, ... (and thus of digital machine and their belief).  
Actually I don't think your theory can derive the number 1.

A bit more below.



> Jon,
>
>Hi.  Thanks for the feedback.  The empty set as the building  
block

> of existence is exactly the point I as making in my original posting
> that started this thread.  What you're referring to as the empty  
set,

> I was referring to as how what has previously been called absolute
> "non-existence" or "nothing" completely describes, or defines, the
> entirety of what is present and is thus an existent state, or
> something. This existent state of mine is what others would call the
> empty set.  The reason this is worth thinking about is because just
> saying that the empty set is the basis of existence doesn't explain
> why that empty set is there in the first place.  This is what I was
> trying to get at.  Additionally, there has to be some mechanism
> inherent in this existent state previously referred to as absolute
> "non-existence" (ie, the empty set) that allows it to replicate  
itself

> and produce the universe, energy, etc. This is needed because it
> appears that there's more to the universe than just a single empty
> existent state and that things are moving around.  What I  
suggested in

> the paper at my website was that:
>
> 1. Assume what has previously been called "absolute non-existence".

This is already unclear by itself. Words like "absolute", "non" and  
"existence" assume a lot.



>
> 2. This "absolute non-existence" itself, and not our mind's  
conception
> of "non-existence", completely describes, or defines, the entirety  
of
> what is there and is thus actually an existent state, or  
"something".


Why? You need some observer of that "absolute non-existence" to get  
a definition of what is there. You are using implicitly the  
reflection axiom of set theory (at this stage you have already a  
theory equivalent with (N, +).



> This complete definition is equivalent to an edge or boundary  
defining

> what is present and thus giving "substance" or existence to the the
> thing.

In your mind only. You go from nothing to the empty set (which is  
not nothing). At the meta level you go from { } to { { } }. So you  
are using again the reflection principle (which is a very strong  
axiom). Without using some explicit axioms, the passage from { } to  
{ { } } needs some brain or universal machine at the meta-level.



> This complete definition, edge, or boundary is like the curly
> braces around the empty set.

Yes, but the ability to put a boundary around what we comprehend is  
a non trivial mind mechanism. Brains (people) and Turing machine  
(the 1-person linked to it) can do that, but not an empty set by  
itself. You are using a rich metalevel to justify a less rich level,  
but your theory needs both the level and the metalevel.



>
> 3. Now, by the assumption in step 1, there is also "absolute non-
> existence" all around the edge of the existent state formed in step
> 2.  This "absolute non-existence" also completely describes, or
> defines the entirety of what is there and is thus also an existent
> state.  That is, the first existent state has reproduced itself.  I
> think that the existenet state that is what has been previously  
called

> "absolute non-existence" has the unique property of being able to
> reproduce itself.

It needs some mind or machine, to do the reflection.


>
> 4. This process continues ad infinitum

Where does that infinitum comes suddenly from? You are assuming the  
natural numbers, like you assume the finite sets above (or  
equivalently the reflection principle).




> in kind of a cellular automaton-
> like process to form in a big bang-like expansion a larger set of
> existent states - our universe.
>
>This is described in mo

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 22 Sep 2011, at 20:01, meekerdb wrote:


On 9/22/2011 10:02 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:



I think what Bruno calls the 323 principle is questionable.


Can I deduce from this that UDA1-7 is understood. This shows  
already that either the universe is "little" or physics is  
(already) a branch of computer science (even if there is a physical  
universe).





It doesn't comport with QM.  Bruno gets around this by noting that  
computationally a classical computer can emulate a quantum  
system.  But I think that assumes an *isolated* quantum system.


Why?


Because the quantum entanglement is in principle unbounded and so it  
would take an infinite classical computer to emulate exactly.


That would only make the comp level *very* low, unless the physical  
universe is infinite from the start, and "I" (my 3-I, my body) is that  
"universe". A tiny classical universal machine, in a steady growing  
universe can emulate a quantum big-bang+expansion, as the UD does  
infinitely often.




In practice we are always satisfied with good approximations.  The  
Hilbert space has N dimensions representing the configurations we  
calculate.  We don't include an N+1st dimension to include  
"something else happens"; but it is implicitly there.





All real quantum systems big enough to be quasi-classical systems  
are impossible to isolate.


But then you have to assume that your brain is some infinite  
quantum system (but then comp is false).


Maybe not infinite but arbitrarily entangled with part of the  
universe which is finite but expanding.


See above.








So I'm afraid this pushes the substitution level all the way down.


Yes, I'm afraid that will be the case.


I tend to look at that as a reductio; but I'm not sure where the  
error is.  I think it is in not allowing that one need only  
*approximate* the function of the brain module the doctor replaces.


But this plead for comp.



But the idea of digital approximation is fuzzy.  The digital  
computation itself has no fuzz.


I am not sure I understand. Comp implies always a choice for some  
truncation. Once done, it has indeed no fuzz, and that is enough to  
chose a classical level of description of "my body", for which the 323- 
principle will be applicable. It seems to me.


Bruno





Brent





If it's all the way down, then as Craig notes, there's really no  
difference between emulation and duplication.


But then you are, like Craig, assuming that mechanism is false.  
This is my point, if we want primitive matter, comp is false. (or  
comp implies no primitive matter, or the falsity of physicalism).


Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Roger Granet]

Bruno,

    Hi.  Yes, I am pretty much a materialist/physicalist.  When people say that 
there are these mathematical truths, platonic ideals, etc. that exist 
somewhere, I always say: Show me where they are.  Point them out now.  So, 
while nobody can disprove the existence of these things, we can't really do 
much with them either it seems to me.  There just more of the things people 
claim to exist but can provide no evidence for.  However, I admit that I can 
also never directly prove my ideas about what used to be called "non-existence" 
because no person or minds would be present there.  All we can do is use our 
unprovable, but hopefully logical, hypotheses to build internally consistent 
models that are consistent with known facts and that eventually can make 
testable predictions.   This is where I want to work towards because otherwise, 
it's all just talk.

    In regards to consciousness, I feel pretty much the same.  Consciousness is 
just the output of all the neurons, neural circuits, ion gradients, etc. in 
your brain.  Again, if it's something else, I'd say: Show me where this 
consciousness/mind is that's not in the brain. My views may be colored by my 
job as a biochemist, though.  But, I'm guessing that most people in science may 
feel this way.

    For trying to think of why there is something rather than nothing, I don't 
think there can be any postulated conscious observer other than some physical 
property intrinsic to whatever existent state we're considering.  Otherwise, 
that doesn't explain where the observer comes from.
  
    Thanks.

 Roger 





>
>From: Bruno Marchal 
>To: everything-list@googlegroups.com
>Sent: Thursday, September 22, 2011 1:02 PM
>Subject: Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?
>
>Roger,
>
>Your theory is still physicalism in disguise. You can't explain consciousness 
>from that.
>I will ask you what is your theory of consciousness, before giving more detail 
>on this.
>
>Your notion of 'nothing' is vague.
>
>You might dig a little bit on mathematical logic: it has been proved that if 
>you don't postulate the natural numbers, then you cannot derive the existence 
>of them. So, unless you defend a form of physical ultrafinitism, your theory 
>cannot account for the existence of 1, 2, 3, ... (and thus of digital machine 
>and their belief). Actually I don't think your theory can derive the number 1.
>A bit more below.
>
>
>
>> Jon,
>> 
>>    Hi.  Thanks for the feedback.  The empty set as the building block
>> of existence is exactly the point I as making in my original posting
>> that started this thread.  What you're referring to as the empty set,
>> I was referring to as how what has previously been called absolute
>> "non-existence" or "nothing" completely describes, or defines, the
>> entirety of what is present and is thus an existent state, or
>> something. This existent state of mine is what others would call the
>> empty set.   The reason this is worth thinking about is because just
>> saying that the empty set is the basis of existence doesn't explain
>> why that empty set is there in the first place.  This is what I was
>> trying to get at.  Additionally, there has to be some mechanism
>> inherent in this existent state previously referred to as absolute
>> "non-existence" (ie, the empty set) that allows it to replicate itself
>> and produce the universe, energy, etc. This is needed because it
>> appears that there's more to the universe than just a single empty
>> existent state and that things are moving around.  What I suggested in
>> the paper at my website was that:
>> 
>> 1. Assume what has previously been called "absolute non-existence".
>
>This is already unclear by itself. Words like "absolute", "non" and 
>"existence" assume a lot.
>
>
>> 
>> 2. This "absolute non-existence" itself, and not our mind's conception
>> of "non-existence", completely describes, or defines, the entirety of
>> what is there and is thus actually an existent state, or "something".
>
>Why? You need some observer of that "absolute non-existence" to get a 
>definition of what is there. You are using implicitly the reflection axiom of 
>set theory (at this stage you have already a theory equivalent with (N, +).
>
>
>> This complete definition is equivalent to an edge or boundary defining
>> what is present and thus giving "substance" or existence to the the
>> thing.
>
>In your mind only. You go from nothing to the empty set (which 

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[meekerdb]

On 9/22/2011 10:02 AM, Bruno Marchal wrote:

I think what Bruno calls the 323 principle is questionable.


Can I deduce from this that UDA1-7 is understood. This shows already that either the 
universe is "little" or physics is (already) a branch of computer science (even if there 
is a physical universe).





It doesn't comport with QM.  Bruno gets around this by noting that computationally a 
classical computer can emulate a quantum system.  But I think that assumes an 
*isolated* quantum system.


Why?


Because the quantum entanglement is in principle unbounded and so it would take an 
infinite classical computer to emulate exactly.  In practice we are always satisfied with 
good approximations.  The Hilbert space has N dimensions representing the configurations 
we calculate.  We don't include an N+1st dimension to include "something else happens"; 
but it is implicitly there.





All real quantum systems big enough to be quasi-classical systems are impossible to 
isolate.


But then you have to assume that your brain is some infinite quantum system (but then 
comp is false).


Maybe not infinite but arbitrarily entangled with part of the universe which is finite but 
expanding.






So I'm afraid this pushes the substitution level all the way down.


Yes, I'm afraid that will be the case.


I tend to look at that as a reductio; but I'm not sure where the error is.  I think it is 
in not allowing that one need only *approximate* the function of the brain module the 
doctor replaces.  But the idea of digital approximation is fuzzy.  The digital computation 
itself has no fuzz.


Brent





If it's all the way down, then as Craig notes, there's really no difference between 
emulation and duplication.


But then you are, like Craig, assuming that mechanism is false. This is my point, if we 
want primitive matter, comp is false. (or comp implies no primitive matter, or the 
falsity of physicalism).


Bruno


http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ 



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 22 Sep 2011, at 08:32, meekerdb wrote:


On 9/21/2011 11:01 PM, Jason Resch wrote:




On Thu, Sep 22, 2011 at 12:36 AM, meekerdb   
wrote:

On 9/21/2011 9:58 PM, Jason Resch wrote:




On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 10:59 PM, meekerdb   
wrote:

On 9/21/2011 6:01 PM, Jason Resch wrote:
When you aren't thinking about what your mother looks like, she  
could look like anyone, because your moment of awareness at that  
point in time is consistent with existence in all those possible  
universes where she is a different person.  When the memory makes  
it into your awareness, it then limits / selects the universes you  
belong to.


Why is it that even though Tegmark wrote a paper showing it,  
nobody wants to admit that the brain is a classical system.


The Brain is classical, I agree.

 Unless you are taking Craig's dualist view that thought and  
memory are independent of your brain, your memory as instantiated  
in your brain already corresponded to who your mother is and to  
most of the rest of your history


Yes, but which brain are you right now?  Are you the Brent in  
universe X whose mother had green eyes, or the Brent in universe Y  
whose mother had brown eyes.  By the time you remember, you will  
have resolved which Brent you are (and correspondingly which  
universe you are in) but then you've opened up new uncertainties,  
and new universes compatible with your existence: Are you in the  
universe where Brent's tooth brush is yellow, or the universe  
where it is red, or some other color?  Until you stop and think,  
and this information enters your awareness (not your brain it is  
already in each of your brains in each of those universes), your  
conscious moment is compatible with Brents in various universes  
where your brush has varying colors.  Of course when you make the  
determination you find a fully coherent and consistent history.   
Receipts for the tooth brush you bought, a picture of your mom on  
the wall, etc.


But that assumes a dualism so that in the universe where my tooth  
brush is yellow (and that is encoded in my brain in that universe),  
my mind is not associated with that brain - it is some uncertain  
state.


As I see it, it is no different than duplicating someone to both  
Washington and Moscow and then when they step outside of the  
teleporter box the sight of the capital building, or red square  
determines their position.


Now assume you are duplicated in universe X and universe Y, in both  
of which which you have an identical mental state.  However, in  
universe X you have a red car, and in universe Y you have a blue  
car.  When this memory surfaces, you identify  which  
universe you are in.  Before the memory of the color of your car  
surfaced, your mental state was identical and it could be said that  
your consciousness supervened on both of them.


  But then when the yellowness or redness of my toothbrush enters  
my consciousness my mind splits into different universes (the many- 
minds interpretation of QM?).  In that case there are many  
classical beings who call themselves Brent and have some memories  
in common.  Why not distinguish them by their bodies/brains?  Why  
think if the mind(s) as being indeterminate and flitting about just  
because they are not instantiating awareness of all that is in the  
brain?


It follows from the ability to be able to resurrect a person at any  
time or any location by making an identical copy.


1. Nothing happens to you between now and the next minute (your  
consciousness continues through that time)
2. 30 seconds from now, you will be blown to pieces, but then  
nanobots will repair you perfectly such that you don't even notice  
(your consciousness continues)
3. You will be blown to pieces, but then nanobots repair you  
perfectly (only this time using different matter) you don't notice  
and your consciousness continues.
4. You will be blow to pieces but then recreated at another  
location in the exact configuration that you were before you were  
blown up (From your perspective your surroundings suddenly and  
inexplicably changed)
5. You are blown up and then two copies of you are created, one in  
your present location and another in a second location.  You now  
cannot be sure which one you will be.


This is the kind of statement I'm questioning.  Who is "you"?   
There's an implicit assumption that "you" are conscious thoughts or  
observer moments, which are disembodied and so the question becomes  
which brain to they supervene on.  But why should be reify "you" as  
these transient thoughts.  Doesn't it make more sense to reify the  
body/brain.  Sure it can be duplicated, but we know where the  
duplicates are and what's in them.


For some short period of time you can be said to be both of them  
(until different sensory data is processed and the minds diverge).
6. You are not blown up, but a second duplicate of you is created  
elsewhere (as before, your mind can be said to in

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

On 21 Sep 2011, at 20:51, meekerdb wrote:


On 9/21/2011 9:20 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
The Mandelbrot set has a definition which we can use to explore  
it's properties.  Would you say the set was non-existent before  
Mandelbrot found it?  If we have to define something for it to  
exist, then what was this universe before there were conscious  
beings in it?


"To exist" just means to occur in the ontology of some model.  We  
have a model of enumeration, which we call "the integers" and a  
model of combining them, which we call "arithmetic".  In this model  
prime numbers "exist" because they satisfy the rules for the  
ontology.  But this kind of "exist" is quite different from the way  
my chair "exists" and the way dinosaurs "existed".


Yes. Now assuming mechanism, we can understand that in fine we have to  
explain the appearance of the existence of chair and dinosaurs from  
the existence of the numbers.




 Whenever one is tempted to write "exist" he should first count to  
ten.


Ten? I think eight is enough :)

With mechanism the question is rather simple. You have the primitive  
existence. It is the usual existence of the numbers, or combinatores,  
java program etc. This does not need to be conceived in any material  
way, and should not be confused with any of their physical, or human  
minded instantiation. Then all other existence are epistemological. So  
you have


1) the existence of the number. Symbolically Ex(x = )  
like Ex(x = 0), Ex(x = s(0)), Ex(x = s(s(s0))), etc.


2) the seven+ notion of existences with the forms:  BExB(x = number with such or such property), and B being defined by Bp, Bp & p,  
etc. Each hypostase defines its own notion of existence, completely  
defined in arithmetic or at the meta-level of arithmetic.
For example, chairs exist in the sense: BDEx(BD(x = such or such property). The "BD", and its arithmetical property  
account of the appearance of the physical aspect (including the  
quantum, and the quale) of the chairs, up to now.


Bruno

http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/



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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Bruno Marchal]

Roger,

Your theory is still physicalism in disguise. You can't explain  
consciousness from that.
I will ask you what is your theory of consciousness, before giving  
more detail on this.


Your notion of 'nothing' is vague.

You might dig a little bit on mathematical logic: it has been proved  
that if you don't postulate the natural numbers, then you cannot  
derive the existence of them. So, unless you defend a form of physical  
ultrafinitism, your theory cannot account for the existence of 1, 2,  
3, ... (and thus of digital machine and their belief). Actually I  
don't think your theory can derive the number 1.

A bit more below.




Jon,

   Hi.  Thanks for the feedback.  The empty set as the building block
of existence is exactly the point I as making in my original posting
that started this thread.  What you're referring to as the empty set,
I was referring to as how what has previously been called absolute
"non-existence" or "nothing" completely describes, or defines, the
entirety of what is present and is thus an existent state, or
something. This existent state of mine is what others would call the
empty set.   The reason this is worth thinking about is because just
saying that the empty set is the basis of existence doesn't explain
why that empty set is there in the first place.  This is what I was
trying to get at.  Additionally, there has to be some mechanism
inherent in this existent state previously referred to as absolute
"non-existence" (ie, the empty set) that allows it to replicate itself
and produce the universe, energy, etc. This is needed because it
appears that there's more to the universe than just a single empty
existent state and that things are moving around.  What I suggested in
the paper at my website was that:

1. Assume what has previously been called "absolute non-existence".


This is already unclear by itself. Words like "absolute", "non" and  
"existence" assume a lot.





2. This "absolute non-existence" itself, and not our mind's conception
of "non-existence", completely describes, or defines, the entirety of
what is there and is thus actually an existent state, or "something".


Why? You need some observer of that "absolute non-existence" to get a  
definition of what is there. You are using implicitly the reflection  
axiom of set theory (at this stage you have already a theory  
equivalent with (N, +).




This complete definition is equivalent to an edge or boundary defining
what is present and thus giving "substance" or existence to the the
thing.


In your mind only. You go from nothing to the empty set (which is not  
nothing). At the meta level you go from { } to { { } }. So you are  
using again the reflection principle (which is a very strong axiom).  
Without using some explicit axioms, the passage from { } to { { } }  
needs some brain or universal machine at the meta-level.




This complete definition, edge, or boundary is like the curly
braces around the empty set.


Yes, but the ability to put a boundary around what we comprehend is a  
non trivial mind mechanism. Brains (people) and Turing machine (the 1- 
person linked to it) can do that, but not an empty set by itself. You  
are using a rich metalevel to justify a less rich level, but your  
theory needs both the level and the metalevel.





3. Now, by the assumption in step 1, there is also "absolute non-
existence" all around the edge of the existent state formed in step
2.   This "absolute non-existence" also completely describes, or
defines the entirety of what is there and is thus also an existent
state.  That is, the first existent state has reproduced itself.  I
think that the existenet state that is what has been previously called
"absolute non-existence" has the unique property of being able to
reproduce itself.


It needs some mind or machine, to do the reflection.




4. This process continues ad infinitum


Where does that infinitum comes suddenly from? You are assuming the  
natural numbers, like you assume the finite sets above (or  
equivalently the reflection principle).





in kind of a cellular automaton-
like process to form in a big bang-like expansion a larger set of
existent states - our universe.

   This is described in more detail in the paper at my website at:

https://sites.google.com/site/ralphthewebsite/filecabinet/why-things-exist-something-nothing

There's also some more detail on how the above process can lead to the
presence of energy in the universe.


You reinvent naïve set theory. It would help you to formalize your  
idea so that you can compare it with others.





   Tegmark's assumption of a mathematical construct as the basis of
our existence doesn't explain where this construct comes from or how
it reproduces to form the universe.


Without assuming the natural numbers, you just cannot get them.




Wheeler's idea that the
distinction between the observer and the observed could be the
mechanism of giving existence to non-existence could be fit into my
i

Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Jason Resch]

On Thu, Sep 22, 2011 at 7:55 AM, Stephen P. King wrote:

>  On 9/22/2011 1:19 AM, Jason Resch wrote:
>


> [SPK]
> Sure, let us consider this similarity to Leibniz' "per-established
> harmony" idea. Could you sketch your thoughts on the similarity that you
> see? I have my own thoughts about pre-established harmony, but I see, in
> Craig's ideas, other concepts similar to those of Leibniz that do relate to
> a notion of "harmony" and other somewhat unrelated concepts but not
> necessarily include the "pre-established" aspect. I haev an argument against
> the concept of "pre-established" as Leibniz uses it.
>
>
>From what I understand of Craig's theory it describes a difference between
first person and third person experience/reality.  Each being two sides of
the same coin, where first person experience is the interior side of what
its like to be the material.  The first person experience of is
indeterminable (and possibly relies on the indeterminism of physics?) and
can cause physical changes above and beyond what can be predicted by any
third-person physics.   While we are a machine according to this theory, we
are a special machine due to our history as organisms and the special
properties of the carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, etc. which form the
basis of our biochemistry.  Functional equivalence is either not possible,
or will lead to various brain disorders or zombies.  Consciousness to Craig
is an epiphenomenon, since he has said there is no reason to evolve this
tehnicolor cartesian theater.

The similarity I see to the pre-established harmony is that Liebniz posits
two realities, a physical reality and reality of experiences.  Each follows
their own laws independently of the other, but physics does not affect or
could not implement a mind, nor is the mind really affecting physics.
Instead, physical law is such that it coincides with what a mind would do
even if there were no mind, and the mind experiences what physical law would
suggest even if there were no physical world.  It is analagous to a
matrix-world where we experiencing a pre-recorded life and experiencing
everything of that individual.  Liebniz postulated his idea when it became
clear that Newton's laws suggested a conservation of not only energy (as
Descartes was aware) but also momentum.  Therefore an immaterial soul could
have no affect on physics.  This led Leibniz to the idea that God setup both
to necessarily agree before hand.

Jason

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Re: Why is there something rather than nothing?

[Stephen P. King]

On 9/22/2011 1:19 AM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 10:40 PM, Stephen P. King 
mailto:stephe...@charter.net>> wrote:


On 9/21/2011 11:00 PM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Sep 21, 2011, at 9:11 PM, "Stephen P. King"
mailto:stephe...@charter.net>> wrote:


On 9/21/2011 9:24 PM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 6:07 PM, Stephen P. King
mailto:stephe...@charter.net>> wrote:

On 9/21/2011 3:06 PM, Jason Resch wrote:



On Wed, Sep 21, 2011 at 12:47 PM, Craig Weinberg
mailto:whatsons...@gmail.com>> wrote:

On Sep 21, 12:20 pm, Jason Resch mailto:jasonre...@gmail.com>> wrote:

Sorry to jump in here..

>
> The Mandelbrot set has a definition which we can use
to explore it's
> properties.

In this kind of context, I think it is useful to make
the distinction
that the Mandlebrot 'set' IS a definition.


Then the important question is whether humans had to write
it down for it to exist.

[SPK]
Why is the question of whether some set of properties
occur given some set of rules and the implementation of
those rules by some process tied to the existence or
non-existence of an object? Since when was it even a
meaningful question? Is existence a property? No,   it   
isnot!




My point is that existence is independent of our implementing
or discovering such properties.  Mandelbrot didn't have to
discover the definition of the Mandelbrot set for the set to
have the properties it has.  He only had to discover it for us
to learn about some of its properties.  If there is another
Mathematical object, and one of its properties is that it
contains self-reproducing patterns which behave intelligently
and form civilizations, we need not find such objects nor
simulate them for those intelligent agents to be.


[SPK]
And my point is that the *properties* cannot be said to be
definite absent specification by equation, rule or equivalent.
Existence is not contingent. Period.



I agree existence is not contingent.  But I go further and say
the properties of those extant things is not contingent either.


[SPK]
Could you please explain to us how that claim is consistent
with the mutual non-commutativity of canonical conjugate variables
(aka properties) in QM?

AFAIK, a wave function or state vector, absent the
specification of a measurement basis must be considered to be in a
state where all of its observable properties are in a state of
linear superposition, this they are 'indefinite" and thus it
follow that they are indeed contingent on the specification of a
basis. Where am I going wrong?


This uncertainty of properties is an artifact of observation, more 
specifically Quantum Mechanics is a consequence of the observer's 
inability to self locate within an infinite structure.  See:

http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0001020


[SPK]
I never quite understood how the non-commutativity of certain 
observables with respect to each other and the Pontryagin duality 
(manifesting as a Fourier transform for example) between discrete and 
compact spaces (inducing basis vectors) follows just from the inability 
to self locate. It seems to me that it is the introduction of the 
Hilbert space and its linear algebraic structure that induces the 
uncertainty. The inability to self-locate seems to just be consistent 
with the 'no preferred basis" aspect.

I would like to read Russell's comment on this.



and
http://arxiv.org/abs/1008.1066
The objects in the individual branches have properties, it is only we 
observers who are uncertain of them.  (We don't know which branch, or 
which one of us, we are in or are)

[SPK]
I did not notice anything new in this paper, by Aguirre et al, that 
Russell didn't cover in his paper.












Would you say the set was non-existent before Mandelbrot
> found it?

I would say that it is still non-existent. What exists
would be a
graphic representation, for instance, of the results
of thousands of
individual function calls which require our visual
sense to be grouped
into a set. Our recognition of pattern against the set
of generic
iterations of the equation plotted visually is what
gives it
explorable properties: The concrete event of the
plotting on a screen
or pencil and paper.


Yet we have only seen an infinitesimally small part of
it.  What ontological status shall we ascribe to the
unseen parts?


[SPK]
Currently unknown. ".../what we/ cannot /talk about we/
must pass over in silence. " or admit that