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I'm really looking forward to this one. Pls let me know any thought/questions.
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... space governed by quantum mechanics (or any other laws of physics, or even just the laws of physics by themselves) is not nothing, and not even an “example” of nothing (whatever an “example of nothing” means), but something. And it remains something rather than nothing even if it is a “good first approximation” to nothing (which is what Krauss presumably meant by “good first example”). When people ask how something could arise from nothing, they don’t mean “How could something arise from almost nothing?” They mean “How could something arise from nothing?” That is to say, from the absence of anything whatsoever -- including the absence of space (empty or otherwise), laws of physics, or anything else. And Krauss has absolutely nothing to say about that, despite it’s being, you know, the question he was asked, and the question he pretended to be answering in his book. (Krauss has the brass later in the show to accuse a fellow panelist of a “bait and switch”!)
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But Krauss simply can’t see the “difference between arguing in favor of an eternally existing creator versus an eternally existing universe without one.” The difference, as the reader of Aristotle or Aquinas knows, is that the universe changes while the unmoved mover does not, or, as the Neoplatonist can tell you, that the universe is made up of parts while its source is absolutely one; or, as Leibniz could tell you, that the universe is contingent and God absolutely necessary. There is thus a principled reason for regarding God rather than the universe as the terminus of explanation.
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Krauss’ aim is to answer the question “Why is there something rather than nothing?” without resorting to God”and also without bothering to study what previous thinkers of genius have said about the matter. Like Richard Dawkins, Stephen Hawking, Leonard Mlodinow, and Peter Atkins, Krauss evidently thinks that actually knowing something about philosophy and theology is no prerequisite for pontificating on these subjects.
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Nor is it merely the traditional theological answer to the question at hand that Krauss does not understand. Krauss doesn’t understand the question itself. There is a lot of farcical chin-pulling in the book over various “possible candidates for nothingness” and “what ‘nothing’ might actually comprise,” along with an earnest insistence that any “definition” of nothingness must ultimately be “based on empirical evidence” and that “‘nothing’ is every bit as physical as ‘something’””as if “nothingness” were a highly unusual kind of stuff that is more difficult to observe or measure than other things are.
Of course, “nothing” is not any kind of thing in the first place but merely the absence of anything.
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The latest in a series of book trumpeting a supposed solution to the mystery of existence, Lawrence Krauss's A Universe from Nothing (Free Press, 2012) is basically a superior and accessible rehashing of the concept of the "landscape." Also known as the "multiverse," that is the idea that our universe is embedded within an ensemble of other universes.
Though according to this hypothesis our universe is a "part" of the landscape in some sense, it has no spacetime connection with any of the other universes. This means that they can have no causal influence on us, or we on them.
That makes it tough to gather evidence that these other universes actually exist -- but let that pass.
I won't go into the details of the arguments for and against the landscape hypothesis here. There is no lack of popular books covering this material.1
The point of greatest interest is the extent to which the proposal is ad hoc speculation -- as opposed to a genuine inference from hard facts -- and on this point, expert opinion is divided.
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In a nutshell, it's this: There is no contradiction involved in supposing that the universe never existed.
In other words, while I cannot consistently imagine a square circle, I can consistently imagine that nothing at all ever existed.
This means the universe is what philosophers call "contingent" (meaning not logically necessary).
This means that, since the universe apparently did not have to exist, we are entitled to ask why it does in fact exist.
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As an aside, one might well wonder: How is God an improvement over the laws of nature, in this respect?
Theologians speak of God's mode of being as "necessary," unlike the world's, which is contingent, as we have seen. So, it is a crude mistake simply to ask, as atheists are wont to do: "Who made God?"
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The late-antique and medieval Christian and Islamic thinkers who first clearly saw all this liked to express the point slightly differently: Creator and creation are two radically distinct things.
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Yep.When people ask how something could arise from nothing, they don’t mean “How could something arise from almost nothing?” They mean “How could something arise from nothing?”
I watched The Unbelievers... it's very well done. I get where these guys are coming from... they can't get past religious craziness... I get that. I think Krauss come off as very intelligent and likable. I agree with some of his points. I'm looking forward to it.You'll probably need to brush up on the philosophy of definitions and meanings etc. Maybe even do a little Wittgenstein. Because I have a feeling the interview will end up something like ... what the definition of "Is Is". Or what is Nothingness? What is Somethingness? I'm not sure how circuitous reasoning will be avoided. Similar to how the new neo-physicalists are now redefining materialism. Definitions are going to have to be agreed upon here to have any kind of logical discussion in my opinion.
Question: how far can you take materialism before you really can't call it materialism anymore? When you've entered into models, definitions and the well known linguistic landscape of transcendental philosophy? The materialists keep on wanting to call the elephant in the room a kangeroo to prove their materialism. When in actuality it is an elephant by any other name.
Should be an interesting interview Alex. I'll be interested on how you approach it. 0.0 Probably will have far more patience than I would ever have. Thank goodness you're doing the interview. heh
My Best,
Bertha
Yeah, you can't ding them too much for religious "craziness". Most institutional religion is badly outdated now, and is intellectually repugnant in many areas, anthropomorphism for example.I watched The Unbelievers... it's very well done. I get where these guys are coming from... they can't get past religious craziness... I get that. I think Krauss come off as very intelligent and likable. I agree with some of his points. I'm looking forward to it.
I watched The Unbelievers... it's very well done. I get where these guys are coming from... they can't get past religious craziness... I get that. I think Krauss come off as very intelligent and likable. I agree with some of his points. I'm looking forward to it.
... If, for some unforeseen reason, the landscape turns out to be inconsistent - maybe for mathematical reasons, or because it disagrees with observation ... then as things stand now we will be in a very awkward position. Without any explanation of nature’s fine-tunings we will be hard pressed to answer the ID critics.
To the hard-line physicist, the multiverse may not be entirely respectable, but it is at least preferable to invoking a Creator. Indeed, anthropically inclined physicists like Susskind and Weinberg are attracted to the multiverse precisely because it sees to dispense with God as the explanation of cosmic design.
.Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door
As a man who has devoted his whole life to the most clear headed science, to the study of matter, I can tell you as a result of my research about atoms this much: There is no matter as such. All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind. This mind is the matrix of all matter.
Das Wesen der Materie [The Nature of Matter], speech at Florence, Italy (1944) (from Archiv zur Geschichte der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Abt. Va, Rep. 11 Planck, Nr. 1797)
"Consciousness cannot be accounted for in physical terms. For consciousness is absolutely fundamental. It cannot be accounted for in terms of anything else."
In his treatise The Mathematical Foundations of Quantum Mechanics, John von Neumann deeply analyzed the so-called measurement problem. He concluded that the entire physical universe could be made subject to the Schrödinger equation (the universal wave function). Since something "outside the calculation" was needed to collapse the wave function, von Neumann concluded that the collapse was caused by the consciousness of the experimenter.[22]
Wikipedia
He's the equivalent polar opposite of the kind of mentality he's teasing with continuous jokes in his talk, that of obtuse creationists. Unfortunately he's spent most of his energies for the book in finding an argument to definitely "disprove" that a creator God is required to give birth to the universe.I'm starting to watch this video to see if any questions come to mind.
yep... the creeping is the prob :)Yeah, you can't ding them too much for religious "craziness". Most institutional religion is badly outdated now, and is intellectually repugnant in many areas, anthropomorphism for example.
So it will be an interesting discussion. What is fascinating I find is this slow creep of science into areas of thought that have indeed, been traditionally transcendental in nature. Questions like non-locality, things always existing, multi-dimensions, etc. What I think is flawed in materialistic reasoning is the mechanistic, nihilistic underpinnings they often insist upon regarding existence. How does indeed, complex meaningful order come from non-order? How does love come from selfishness? How does consciousness arise from inert matter?
My Best,
Bertha
good stuff... mutliple shows here... too much to cover with Dr. Krauss.On atheist scientists being stuck on religion and allowing that to interfere with their scientific objectivity:
http://ncu9nc.blogspot.com/2014/08/multiverse-theories-fail-to-explain-our.html
Gordon next asks why materialists persist in believing in multiverses? To answer that question Gordon give a series of quotes:
Leonard Susskind, professor of theoretical physics, Stanford university:
Bernard Carr, University of London
Richard Lewontin, evolutionary biologist, Harvard University.
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Atheists scientists complain that when scientists take an empirical approach to investigating spiritual phenomena, they are motivated by religious beliefs, but it is clear that some atheist scientists are motivated by atheism. What does Krauss think about that? Does atheist motivation discredit scientific work?
Materialists admit they believe in absurd things because they do not want to believe an intelligence designed and created the universe. It is ironic because believing in a multiverse requires believing in many much more absurd things than believing in a transcendent creator does. Gordon Closes with a slide that explains the absurdity of materialism:
- In the multiverse, anything can happen for no reason at all.
- In other words, the materialist is forced to believe in random miracles as an explanatory principle.
- In a theistic universe, nothing happens without a reason. Miracles are therefore intelligently directed deviations from divinely maintained regularities, and thus are expressions of rational purpose.
Many scientists believe the evidence that the universe was designed. These scientists include Nobel prize winners such as Albert Einstein, Werner Heisenberg, Guglielmo Marconi, Brian Josephson, William Phillips, Richard Smalley, Arno Penzias, Charles Townes Arthur Compton, Antony Hewish, Christian Anfinsen, Walter Kohn, Arthur Schawlow, and other scientists, Charles Darwin, Sir Fred Hoyle, John von Neumann, Wernher von Braun, and Louis Pasteur.
- Scientific materialism is epistemically self-defeating: it makes scientific rationality impossible.
http://sites.google.com/site/chs4o8pt/eminent_researchers
great stuff... we'll see how much I can get to.He's the equivalent polar opposite of the kind of mentality he's teasing with continuous jokes in his talk, that of obtuse creationists. Unfortunately he's spent most of his energies for the book in finding an argument to definitely "disprove" that a creator God is required to give birth to the universe.
How ironic that at ~50':00" in his talk he addresses the listeners by reminding them how irrelevant we're in the cosmos and how this should give us a sense of humility in science,
"The recognition that we don't understand everything", he says. After 45 minutes of rant about how he knows for sure how the universe got booted up :D
Man, this guy is another great stand up comedian.
More to the point of his scientific idea ... spoiler alert: 99% of his theory revolves around the fact that quantum field theory allows the ocean of virtual particles pervading the vacuum of space to give raise to any amount of matter. For some reason he has decided that scalar fields of virtual particles can be defined as "nothing" and there is your explanation.... a "universe from nothing". Or more correctly ... "how matter might have arisen from quantum fields fluctuations which neither explains the origin of those fields, nor that of space, time and the law of physics"
Of course you can imagine the amount of face palms that this sort of thinking have caused to most experts... but there have you it. That's probably the best intellectual level you can get to oppose a bible thumping creationist.
David Albert did an eloquent review and critique on the NY:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/b...y-lawrence-m-krauss.html?_r=2&pagewanted=all&