In a previous post I described three approaches to describing reality. Each of them represented a different paradigm, or way of looking at the same things. They do not contradict each other and might be equally true. In the same way, there is more than one way to look at classifying paradigms. Somebody else might instead have classified theories of everything into reductionist and wholist models. Since elements of reductionism and wholism exist in the matter-energy, space-time, and mind-spirit approaches, these two ways of looking at classification have nothing to do with each other and thus represent different paradigms of classification. The question of whether the matter-energy approach is more reductionist or wholist is meaningless.
When people disagree, they often disagree on more than the answers; they disagree on the questions, too. My experience in life has been that most people are only ever aware of one way of looking at things, whereas I enjoy learning the basics of every school of thought. When it comes to politics, sociology, economics, religion, and morality, this lack of understanding can lead to unnecessary strife. Take the three approaches to sociology for example: Structural-Functional: This approach begins with asking what role an institution or individual plays in the community and what good is derived from it. For example, slavery and hierarchy provide a more efficient division of labor and coherence of leadership than if everybody did their own thing. It is assumed that all societal arrangements are good for the community as a whole, though some practices may be better than others. Social-Conflict: This approach begins by asking who benefits at whose expense by having a particular institution in play. For example, respect for property rights benefits those with property at the expense of those without the means to join them. It is assumed that all societal arrangements hurt somebody. Symbolic-Interactive: This approach begins by questioning how it happens that the members of society even agree on what is good and bad. While a social-conflict theorist would see the Amish as somehow oppressed and a structural-functional theorist would see their existence as important to defining cultural standards, a symbolic-interactive theorist recognizes that the Amish live the way they do because they want to and asks why we don’t all live the same way. Another source of conflict is the way that liberals and conservatives understand government. “Liberal” and “conservative” are words with no agreed upon meaning, but to the extent that an agreement exists I have noticed a correlation in their approach to politics. Perfect Government: Ask a conservative to describe his perfect government and he will likely begin by listing the different ways in which power will be divided and restricted in order to prevent corruption and dictatorship. No minimum guaranteed level of government provision will be mentioned because it will be assumed that the people through their representatives will pass laws and spending to take care of that. Ask a liberal to describe his perfect government and he will likely begin listing all the different projects and programs that he wants fully funded. No suggestion of where the funds and resources might come from will be mentioned because it will be assumed that anything that can be done through the government will be. The conservative sees government as just one of many competing societal interests while the liberal sees it as the all-encompassing expression of all people in society. Nature Of Politics: Ask a conservative his political views and he will likely begin listing all ways he agrees and disagrees with current government policy. He may also have opinions on medicine, technology, education, religion, hiring practices, and how to raise a family, but none of these are considered political opinions or even proper things for a government to be involved in. Ask a liberal his political views and he will likely begin listing all the groups in society being oppressed by other groups. To them, the relative prestige, education, finances, and other forms of power between people is just as much politics as government policy. Workplace politics is still politics. Do you have a different way of looking at things?
0 Comments
Is it PC to say that computers byte?
If someone eats his words, do they become an inside joke? Does anyone ever win the human race? If laughter is good medicine, does bad medicine bring sighed effects? If someone is tongue-tied, does that mean they can knot spell? Why aren't brand-new cars called wreckless? What happens if you break wind while shooting the breeze? If one who creates art is an artist, is one who competes in races a racist? Why aren't tube socks considered unseemly? Are pilots plane-spoken? Does a priest have an altar-ego? Can a bearded man tell a bald-faced lie? Why is it that "out of it" and "out to lunch" have much the same meaning, yet the combination of the two, "out of lunch" means something else entirely? Is a monogram just twenty percent of a pentagram? Which is worse? To eat something off the floor, or to eat something on the floor? Which is worse? To have the crap beaten out of you, or to have the crap beaten into you? One time, I was thinking of all the different attempts to explain all of reality in terms of a small set of principles and I realized there were three different categories of them. I call them the matter-energy approach, the space-time approach, and the mind-spirit approach. Because they approach reality from completely different perspectives, they do not contradict each other and so might be equally true.
Matter-Energy: In this approach matter and energy are all that exist. Matter is convertible into energy through annihilation. Mass (resistance to change in velocity) is caused by the Higgs energy field. All energy fields come in discrete quanta and all fundamental particles come with quantum-mechanical wave functions. All fields are expressible in terms of a single, unified field that manifests itself differently in different situations. The mind and spirit are actually just manifestations of material interaction, such as a network of firing neurons. Space and time are actually just manifestations of material interaction too, creating imaginary phase-spaces. For example, suppose a set of particles existing on top of one another in a point of zero dimension were able to take on different values of some property existing along a spectrum, such as color. Suppose that particles were able to interact strongly with other particles of the same color but weakly with particles of the next color on the spectrum and very weakly with particles of a color further along the spectrum. Should any sentient citizens inhabit this zero-dimensional realm, they would interpret color as a spatial dimension. In the same way, all dimensions are illusions in this approach. Models tending to focus on matter and energy include Newtonian gravity, quantum electrodynamics, quantum chromodynamics, super-symmetry, and the idea that we might be living in a holographic simulation running on a computer of fewer spatial dimensions than we observe inside our simulation. It is the most popular approach of thinkers in this age. Space-Time: In this approach space and time are all that exist, forming a cohesive “spacetime,” the only difference between them being that objects extend along the temporal dimension forever, even when they are spatially small. Each particle experiences time in a different direction depending on its velocity. Particles themselves are merely tiny regions of highly curved space, affecting the way other particles move around them. These effects are “fictitious forces.” Matter is an illusion. The topology and geometry of all the dimensions of spacetime (including some that may be tightly curved to be very small in extent) are what give rise to everything we interpret as forces. Models tending to focus on space and time include special relativity, general relativity, and the Kaluza-Klein theory. This approach was popular in the first half of the twentieth century but has since stalled. Mind-Spirit: In this approach only information exists. Starting with the sure knowledge that the mind exists (without which we could not know anything), students of this school of thought break the mind down into its fundamental building blocks (e.g. perceptions, sensations) to understand it. These are measured and classified. In the same way that characters in a script or dream are mere manifestations of a higher consciousness (the writer or dreamer), we and our universe are a manifestation of some higher mind. By our minds being extensions of this same supermind we are all connected. The only reason we believe that minds require brains and therefore matter to exist is because those are the current rules inside this dream. Matter, energy, space, and time are nothing but illusions created by the mind. Physics is a result of bits of information copying and destroying each other. The mind-body problem is solved by not having bodies. This approach has been hinted at in limited ways by philosophers and religious leaders throughout history. Cellular automata is a related idea. It came closest to being true science in the work of Descartes and Locke, but has since stalled. There are many YouTube channels that describe physics and cosmology, but by far the best that I’ve discovered is PBSspacetime. Things are actually explained, including the uncertainty principle, black holes, dark energy, and dark matter. It’s very interesting.
If you like biology, you may also be interested in PBSeons, and if you like random ramblings of history, language, science, and philosophy trivia, you might like Vsauce. Q: What do you call someone who makes a big stink and brings you to court?
A: A sewer! Q: What type of person uses a bike trail after committing a crime? A: A cycle-path Q: What did one magician ask the other? A: A trick question Q: What do you call variables that share an apartment? A: Coefficients Q: What do you call a contractor that uses a hammer? A: A hit man Q: How do you deflate a blimp? A: Remove the letter B. In the eighteenth century scientists discovered that lightning was made of the same electricity as static discharges. In the nineteenth century scientists discovered that electricity and magnetism were related. They described the phenomenon as different manifestations of the same underlying force named electromagnetism, which operated through something called an electromagnetic field. They predicted the existence of ripples in this field called electromagnetic waves. Later it was found that visible light was an electromagnetic wave. Radio waves, microwaves, infrared light, ultraviolet light, x-rays, and gamma rays were also shown to be electromagnetic, made of the same “stuff” and differing only in wavelength. At the atomic scale, electromagnetic forces drive chemical reactions and bonding. The magnetic, electrical, optic, chemical, and physical properties of all substances are governed by the electromagnetic force. What were once thought of as separate phenomena are now described in terms of a single theory.
At the same time, gravity was used to explain both falling apples and the movement of the planets. The various behaviors of the atomic nucleus were described in terms of two forces: the strong nuclear force and the weak nuclear force (physicists apparently have no imagination when it comes to names). Might this trend continue? Is it possible to explain everything in terms of one force? This is what physicists have been trying to do for a century now. Some progress seems to have been made. The Kaluza-Klein theory unified gravity and electromagnetism, and the standard model of particle physics unified the weak nuclear force, the strong nuclear force, and electromagnetism. Unfortunately, the two theories are incompatible with each other. Numerous other candidate models have been proposed to unify all four forces, such as superstrings, super-symmetry, Penrose twistors, the holographic universe, cellular automata, and quantum loop gravity. There are problems with each. For some, the math is so hard that we can’t be sure they even work at all. For others, they are so versatile in explaining everything that they can explain anything – meaning they make no testable predictions to disprove them. In everything I read on the subject, it is simply assumed that a unified field exists to explain all fields, both for bosons and fermions. Why? I have always wondered whether a unified field theory is even possible. What if the four forces are truly separate and fundamental? Could it be that nature is infinitely complex, with baryons being made of quarks, being made of still smaller particles, being made of still smaller particles, and so on forever? Since math is the foundation of physics, doesn’t Goedel’s theorem imply that any “theory of everything” must necessarily be either incomplete or inconsistent? The same could be said of any set of rules, including those of moral philosophy. It seems that when I try to organize a set of principles from which right and wrong can be determined, there are always situations in which they either do not apply or else yield contradictory answers. The best example is land ownership. I believe in property rights. Land claims must be first-come-first-served. What is to be done with landless nomads, then? What is to be done with the homeless? Humans are material objects that take up space. They have to be somewhere. When the whole world is taken, where do they go? Who’s yard do they camp in? Yours? It would make sense to take a tiny sliver from everyone’s land to gather together in one place for them, but this is not how space works. It would make sense to cut up the nomads and distribute their matter equally across all lands, but this is not how the human body works. Instead, the majority of landowners will be blissfully unaware of the problem, while a minority will find their properties overrun. While it is perfectly permissible to defend your livelihood by driving the intruders away, it is also perfectly permissible for the intruders to defend themselves from being constantly driven from one place to another. Conflict is unavoidable and because any conflict can contain an element of this one (imagine the intruders taking over the government, taxing the landowners, and using the money to buy places for themselves), it can no longer be said who is right and who is wrong. Morality completely breaks down. I am not a relativist. There is still a right choice and wrong choice in any given situation. It’s just that the underlying principles are infinitely complex and cannot be described ahead of time in a way comprehendible by any finite mind. These subjects I hope to describe in greater detail in the book I’m still writing. There are many YouTube channels featuring and explaining math, such as Mathologer and
MindYourDecisions, but by far the best that I’ve been able to find is Numberphile. They generally do a good job explaining the derivation of their theorems, but even when they don’t they are valuable for the wonder they induce and for the small tidbits of knowledge that can be combined with facts heard elsewhere to build up a more complete picture of things. It’s fascinating. Many times I have gone online just to watch one or two videos and ended up staying up all night. Why are there infinite magic squares and only two magic hexagons? What is the longest possible game of tree? What are the spooky connections between the parts of the triangle? How can the same equation lead to such simple order and such complex chaos by only slightly changing one variable? What is a strange attractor? Can we find the digits of pi hiding in the Mandelbrot set? Can we find the Fibonacci sequence hiding in the Mandelbrot set? Why is 41 special? I finally found a roundabout way to get videos from my phone into my PC and onto the blog. Enjoy! Running Turtle Honeymoon Island Magic Coffee Some have suggested that our four-dimensional spacetime might be a sort of “membrane” moving through a higher-dimensional spacetime and that it is possible that it could move in such a way that time for us would simply stop. There would be no way to see the end of time coming, but one prediction of the theory is that space would expand, pushing the galaxies apart – which is exactly what we observe.
As a side note, I have also heard that if the accelerating expansion of the universe continues forever, that it will eventually pull atoms apart and leave fundamental particles stranded with no way to interact with others as space expands faster than light. Since fundamental particles by definition have no internal mechanisms that could represent a changed state over time, time would be meaningless. After reading about this theory I had a thought: If it is possible for time to abruptly end in the middle of things, is it also possible for it to abruptly begin in the middle of things? Why not? Could it be that the big bang never happened and the universe started up in its fully formed state? Could it be that humans never evolved but instead descended from a pair named Adam and Eve who had no parents and no childhood? Obviously, this proves nothing. It’s just an interesting possibility that arises when you start playing around with time. What do you think? I've seen your mercy
I've experienced your generosity I lack no faith in your greatness I know I'll soon be set free You give me hope In that coming happy day But knowing the distant future Can't ease my present pain How long to wait Until I win? Your love is endless But does it begin? It's too late I need help fast Nothing that happens now Can make up the past You rescue me from danger You protect and you provide But who will save me From who I am inside? You promise me paradise So I can live with you But how can it be Heaven If I must be there to? How long to wait Until I win? Your love is endless But does it begin? It's too late I need help fast Nothing that happens now Can make up the past Aaaah Aaaah Aaaah Aaaah I've learned when to make an effort I've learned when to step away Then I learned that The rules change every day I've learned to be patient I've learned to prioritize I trust that you will answer But you only deliver hollow lies You hide Yourself from me You grant me countless blessings But you hold back what I most need You give me it all And extras too You send your well-wishes But what I need is you My body breaks My mind is gone My heart is dark Because you took too long I'll wait for you And I'll wait some more Even now I know That it's you I adore How long to wait Until I win? Your love is endless But when does it begin? It's too late now I need help fast But nothing that happens now Can ever make up for the paaaaaaaast Aaaah Aaaah Aaaah Aaaah Patience Has run dry Forgot how to laugh Even forgot how to cry My life Is done I breathe my last And you say I've just begun Is this The end? Every time it's over I go around around again Is this My fate? Never satisfied Forever to waaaaaaaaaait |
AuthorMy name is Dan. I am an author, artist, explorer, and contemplator of subjects large and small. Archives
February 2023
Categories
All
|