Big Bang and creation of the universe

08/10/2006 02:04:54 PM · #626

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle just states we cannot KNOW with certainty the outcome of events at a certain atomic level. This is because we alter the events by probing them, not because they are random.

Exactly. Particles have a speed and a direction, but you can only examine either speed or direction accurately at any one time.

08/10/2006 02:07:28 PM · #627

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

BZZZT! Wrong answer. "The uncertainty principle in quantum mechanics is sometimes erroneously explained by claiming that the measurement of position necessarily disturbs a particle's momentum." It's about degrees of randomness.

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Even if they were random, however, we would be left with saying Free Will is a product of a chaotic system instead of an ordered one. How does that help us at all?

Why can't it be a system with laws and principles that predict general tendencies, but with elements of chance on a small scale that can affect the outcome? Essentially the Butterfly Effect.

08/10/2006 02:08:43 PM · #628

Originally posted by legalbeagle:

Exactly. Particles have a speed and a direction, but you can only examine either speed or direction accurately at any one time.

Actually, no. Particles have a speed/direction which are quantumly connected. The combination of the two can be measured, butneither can be measured independently without error because they don't exist without the other. Again, it is not our inability to measure these properties independently (because of some technological limitation), it is that they are connected to the point that they do not exist independently of each other and therefore cannot be measured as such. It is very confusing :)

08/10/2006 02:09:18 PM · #629

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

You point to a whole bunch of factors as being unknown. But if we knew them with enough precision we would know the outcome.

It's not possible to know all factors with absolute precision. That's EXACTLY what the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle is about!

08/10/2006 02:13:26 PM · #630

Originally posted by scalvert:

Only sort of wrong - the problem is not the disturbance by measurement, but rather that speed and location cannot be measured at the same time: to measure speed/direction, the particle must be moving through time, but to measure location, it must be measured at a single point in time. The shorter the timeframe, the more certain you can be with location, but less certain with speed/direction.

08/10/2006 02:15:40 PM · #631

BTW, I am sure that this is impossible to explain or understand properly without a thorough knowledge of the mathematics (which I do not pretend to have).

Message edited by author 2006-08-10 14:15:53.

08/10/2006 02:16:49 PM · #632

Originally posted by legalbeagle:

This is correct. And what it means is that the two pieces of data you are trying to measure cannot be known with any real precision, regardless of whether you try to measure them or not.

08/10/2006 02:18:38 PM · #633

Originally posted by eqsite:

Originally posted by legalbeagle:
Exactly. Particles have a speed and a direction, but you can only examine either speed or direction accurately at any one time.

Actually, no. Particles have a speed/direction which are quantumly connected. The combination of the two can be measured, butneither can be measured independently without error because they don't exist without the other. Again, it is not our inability to measure these properties independently (because of some technological limitation), it is that they are connected to the point that they do not exist independently of each other and therefore cannot be measured as such. It is very confusing :)

I think that I meant speed/direction and location. I agree that they cannot be measured independently, and do not exist independently, but AFAIK particles do have speed, direction and location (even if together they are unknowable).

Message edited by author 2006-08-10 14:19:08.

Tokina AF 12-24mm f/4.0 AT-X Pro DX

08/10/2006 02:19:16 PM · #634

Originally posted by legalbeagle:

BTW, I am sure that this is impossible to explain or understand properly without a thorough knowledge of the mathematics (which I do not pretend to have).

This is also correct, and while once upon a time I actually could get my way through some of these equations, that skill left me many beers ago ;-)

milo655321

Nikon D70

08/10/2006 02:22:12 PM · #635

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

I have heard this argument quite often. The easiest answer is to point out you are setting up a version of Christianity on the level of a six year old. Of course that is gonna be easy to knock down.

I think youâ��re attempting to sidestep the issue and I donâ��t believe I am creating a strawman version of the God of the Bible.

Proposition A: Godâ��s actions are Right by definition.
Proposition B: God commands killing of the Amorites.
Conclusion: Killing Amorites is Right.

Whether or not the logic behind this proof can be created or understood by a 6 year old is irrelevant. Where is the fault in the proof? Are Godâ��s actions Right by definition? According to you, yes, Godâ��s actions are Right by definition. Does God command the Israelites to killing the Amorites? Yes, God commands the killing of the Amorites. Doesnâ��t it then logically follow that the killing of the Amorites is a Right and moral act? Are there any flaws in the above propositions? If there are, I canâ��t see them.

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Nobody is claiming morality is simple.
God's actions are Right by definition. He is the ultimate standard. He is the measuring stick by which theists can claim absolute Truth.

Then the killing of male children Amorites is moral. If it were not moral, God, as the standard of morality, would not have commanded it.

08/10/2006 02:22:37 PM · #636

OK, for the sake of the argument, I will assume I have misinterpreted (at least commonly) the HUP. I went to Scalvert's bible and it was quite a bit above my head, but did say that the "observer effect" was a common misinterpretation of the HUP.

That being said, I have two points.

1) The HUP quickly degrades when you reach the macroatomic level. This is patently obvious by anybody who has taken high school physics or has observed the world around them. We can clearly know cause and effect in the observable world. If quantum jitters really did exert an effect on the world, we should be able to observe it as a breakdown of things we think should happen.

2) Free Will is no more real if there is chaos at the bottom of the well than if there is order. My observation about myself is that I have Free Will. I can dictate my actions. It seems to be separate from the Natural World where nothing else acts like this. Added on this is the second dilemma that if my observation about my own Free Will is illusory, then how can I trust any other observation I make? If I don't know I have Free Will, how do I know anything else?

08/10/2006 02:23:06 PM · #637

Originally posted by legalbeagle:

One way to think about it is that these properties are actually differenct representations of some other property and a particle can express that base property in different ways. This, for instance, allows speed to be converted into mass or a change of direction spontaneously. This process is what makes semi-conductors work and gives us this wonderful forum.

08/10/2006 02:25:35 PM · #638

The quote is too long Milo so I'll just respond.

Your supposition is correct. Killing the Amorites is moral and Right. But how does this surprise you? We sanction killing in many ways in our own society? God's actions are Right by definition. This beacon or pole to which all other actions are judged is only available to Theists (and actually only available to monotheists).

08/10/2006 02:26:23 PM · #639

Originally posted by eqsite:

Originally posted by legalbeagle:
Only sort of wrong - the problem is not the disturbance by measurement, but rather that speed and location cannot be measured at the same time: to measure speed/direction, the particle must be moving through time, but to measure location, it must be measured at a single point in time. The shorter the timeframe, the more certain you can be with location, but less certain with speed/direction.

This is correct. And what it means is that the two pieces of data you are trying to measure cannot be known with any real precision, regardless of whether you try to measure them or not.

This does not change the premise that if particles react in a consistent fashion when they collide depending on their physical characteristics, the universe was set on a single path when all particles exploded from the singularity.

The HUP does explain why we cannot use our knowledge of how particles react in order to accurately predict what will happen - it is impossible to collect all the data about a particle.

And unfortunately, it also means that (unless we can invent Heisenberg Dampeners) Star Trek-style transporters are out of the question...

08/10/2006 02:32:11 PM · #640

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

That being said, I have two points.

1) The HUP quickly degrades when you reach the macroatomic level. This is patently obvious by anybody who has taken high school physics or has observed the world around them. We can clearly know cause and effect in the observable world. If quantum jitters really did exert an effect on the world, we should be able to observe it as a breakdown of things we think should happen.

God is in the details and quantum jitters do exert an effect on the world. They just average out to the point that they are unnoticable.

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

2) Free Will is no more real if there is chaos at the bottom of the well than if there is order. My observation about myself is that I have Free Will. I can dictate my actions. It seems to be separate from the Natural World where nothing else acts like this. Added on this is the second dilemma that if my observation about my own Free Will is illusory, then how can I trust any other observation I make? If I don't know I have Free Will, how do I know anything else?

And again, this is a question that I personally believe science doesn't have an answer for. Maybe it will, maybe it won't. Conscience may be something that bubbles out of the quantum foam in our neural pathways, or it may be a divine spark. I don't have that answer, and I would be suspect of anyone who claimed to. But either way, how can we say for cerain whether humans are alone on this planet in possessing it?

08/10/2006 02:40:09 PM · #641

Originally posted by legalbeagle:

Actually what it means is that either the universe was set on an infinite number of paths (mutliple universe theory) and we have no way of knowing which one we are on, or the path that the universe was set on can change spontaneously and unpredicatably. I'm not sure either of these is very comforting, but science has never been very good at that.

Originally posted by legalbeagle:

The HUP does explain why we cannot use our knowledge of how particles react in order to accurately predict what will happen - it is impossible to collect all the data about a particle.

Again, no. You keep making it sound like if only we could make those measurement we would be able to know. But quantum mechanics says that we can't know, regardless of our ability to measure.

Originally posted by legalbeagle:

And unfortunately, it also means that (unless we can invent Heisenberg Dampeners) Star Trek-style transporters are out of the question...

Interestingly enough, scientists have quantumly transported information, which leaves promise of these things potentially being possible, although the energy requirments for large scale items are at this point impossibly large to consider.

08/10/2006 02:41:17 PM · #642

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

If quantum jitters really did exert an effect on the world, we should be able to observe it as a breakdown of things we think should happen.

Butterfly Effect. Small things can eventually lead to a large impact. Thus we observe tiny changes in DNA over many millenia leading to new features and species as the result of those changes yield slight improvements in survival rates.

2) My observation about myself is that I have Free Will.[/quote]

Free will probably is an illusion. No matter how much freedom you think you may have, your will is limited and shaped by culture, experience and physical ability. There are certain things you could (but won't) do, like detonate a suicide belt in a crowded market. By comparison, a chimp is equally free to jump or not jump, stay or leave, etc. but its free will is constrained by different cultures, experiences and physical abilities. Some groups of chimps crack nuts and "fish" for termites while others don't. Some Japanese macaques soak in hot springs while other macaques avoid water. Some young snow monkeys roll snowballs and play with them- no survival benefit, just for fun. I believe that free will is neither free nor the exclusive domain of people.

08/10/2006 02:46:18 PM · #643

Originally posted by scalvert:

Free will probably is an illusion. No matter how much freedom you think you may have, your will is limited and shaped by culture, experience and physical ability. There are certain things you could (but won't) do, like detonate a suicide belt in a crowded market. By comparison, a chimp is equally free to jump or not jump, stay or leave, etc. but its free will is constrained by different cultures, experiences and physical abilities. Some groups of chimps crack nuts and "fish" for termites while others don't. Some Japanese macaques soak in hot springs while other macaques avoid water. Some young snow monkeys roll snowballs and play with them- no survival benefit, just for fun. I believe that free will is neither free nor the exclusive domain of people.

Well, if you are comfortable with the knowledge you are a complex automaton, then so be it. I don't see anybody acting like they truly believe this knowledge though so I doubt anybody truly believes it in their heart. It's Fatalism at its strongest.

It does looks like at least I've gotten you to pick that oar up again and help row in our "Boat of Belief".

Tokina AF 12-24mm f/4.0 AT-X Pro DX

08/10/2006 02:47:15 PM · #644

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Your supposition is correct. Killing the Amorites is moral and Right....God's actions are Right by definition.

Then by extension slavery is moral and right. :-/

milo655321

Nikon D70

08/10/2006 02:48:16 PM · #645

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

If I saw an Amorite boy tomorrow, would it be moral for me to kill him?

08/10/2006 02:49:20 PM · #646

Originally posted by eqsite:

Again, no. You keep making it sound like if only we could make those measurement we would be able to know. But quantum mechanics says that we can't know, regardless of our ability to measure.

Does the impossibility of measurement really mean that particles do not have the qualities? I had understood that this same issue had vexed Stephen Hawking and he had to find quite an esoteric answer to it (quantum uncertainty at the edges of black holes meaning that information can be randomly be passed back into the universe, that being the disproof of the concept that the information within the universe is complete and certain).

Originally posted by eqsite:

I have read about that. Photons being transmitted. The problem with transporters is not the transfer of information over distance and its recreation (although these are difficult and energy consuming), but determining what information needs to be sent. It would be impossible to measure the location, direction and speed at a single point in time of all of the particles in a complex object to determine how they should be recreated.

08/10/2006 02:50:00 PM · #647

Originally posted by DrAchoo:

Well then, to use YOUR logic, if animals don't have free will, then you should be able to predict with absolute certainty the behavior of a tiger or bear. That didn't work out so well for Roy Horn or that bear guy in Vancouver.

08/10/2006 02:53:45 PM · #648

Originally posted by milo655321:

If I saw an Amorite boy tomorrow, would it be moral for me to kill him?

Isn't that the premise Muslim fundamentalists use to kill adulterers, etc.? They just have a different, equally unprovable Word of God as their absolute moral standard.

08/10/2006 02:58:15 PM · #649

Originally posted by legalbeagle:

Well there you've gone and hit the limit of my understanding! As for transportation, I believe you are correct, but I'd have to look up the research again. I remember reading that it left some doors open for actual teleportation (at least at light speed), but I don't remember enough to talk about it.